08.11.2006
Unreasonable delays by the Interior Ministry in granting a stay permit as part of the procedure for family unification: HaMoked petitioned to the Court of Administrative Affairs, stating this is a grave breach of procedure which the Interior Ministry undertook before the court. It seems that authorization for the invited spouse’s stay permit is delayed in an attempt by the Israel Security Agency to coerce him to serve as a collaborator
On November 8, 2006, HaMoked petitioned the Court of Administrative Affairs, following the Ministry of Interior's extreme delay in granting a request made by the couple - an Israeli resident and a resident of the Occupied Territories, who are in the process of family unification, to extend the spouse's permit to stay in Israel. The petition states this is an extreme violation of the Interior Ministry's commitment made in the context of AP 612/04 Dahud et al. v. the Minister of Interior et al. Under this commitment, if the stay permit cannot be extended to the full term set in the graduated procedure on the date the applicant presents himself in the bureau of the Interior Minister, the permit he holds shall be temporarily extended for six months, providing security officials do not oppose thereto. The procedure is intended to guarantee a continuous lawful stay for those whose request for family unification was accepted, and are going through the graduated procedure for examining eligibility for permanent residency. It should be noted that the procedure was reached after years of endless delays in processing requests for extending permits as part of the graduated procedure.
The petitioner in the current case is an Israeli resident who lives in Jerusalem with her spouse, a Palestinian ID holder, and their six children. In 1994, the petitioner applied for family unification for her spouse. Only in 2000, after a petition to the High Court of Justice, her request was approved and from then on the petitioners have been in the process of family unification. As part of the procedure, the petitioners made several applications to extend the husband's Israeli stay permit, as proscribed in the set regulations of the Interior Ministry. Nonetheless, on its own part, the Interior Ministry avoided upholding the regulations on the processing of requests, and as result, the petitioner was present in Israel without a valid permit for many months. The Interior Ministry's stalling in regards to the request to extend the petitioner's stay permit, has been now ongoing for eleven months, thus the petitioner has been present in Israel for the past eight months without a valid permit.
The Interior Ministry's delay in formalizing the petitioner's status in Israel leaves him routinely exposed to detentions, arrests and the constant threat of expulsion. He is deprived of his freedom, his work is in jeopardy and the whole family is under economic and mental duress. The only apparent reason for holding back the process of the petitioner's request seems to be the attempts to pressure him to serve as collaborator of the Israel Security Agency. Such pressure by the authorities is unjust and unlawful, not least when the petitioner is legally entitled to the withheld permit.
