Full Description
Emptied Lands investigates the protracted legal, planning, and territorial conflict between the settler Israeli state and indigenous Bedouin citizens over traditional lands in southern Israel/Palestine. The authors place this dispute in historical, legal, geographical, and international-comparative perspectives, providing the first legal geographic analysis of the "dead Negev doctrine" used by Israel to dispossess and forcefully displace Bedouin inhabitants in order to Judaize the region. The authors reveal that through manipulative use of Ottoman, British and Israeli laws, the state has constructed its own version ofterra nullius. Yet, the indigenous property and settlement system still functions, creating an ongoing resistance to the Jewish state.Emptied Lands critically examines several key land claims, court rulings, planning policies, and development strategies, offering alternative local, regional, and international routes for justice.
Contents
Introduction: Terra Nullius in Zion?
1. The Legal Geography of Indigenous Bedouin Dispossession
2. The Land Regime of the Late Ottoman Period
3. The Land Regime of the Mandate Period
4. Formulating the Dead Negev Doctrine During the Israeli Period
5. Historical Geography of the Negev: Bedouin Agriculture
6. Bedouin Territory and Settlement
7. The Bedouin as an Indigenous Community
8. International Law, Indigenous Land Rights, and Israel
9. State and Bedouin Policies and Plans
Conclusion:
