On August 2, 2011,
the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories announced "measures and gestures towards the Gaza strip in honor of the Ramadan month". The military announced, inter alia, the change in the population registry of the addresses of over 1,900 Gaza residents living in the West bank, who are listed in a Gaza address, and additionally, announced an additional allocation of water from Israel to Gaza "in order to improve the quantity and quality of drinking water for the population in the Gaza Strip".
The change of address "gesture" is in fact a rehash of a previous Israeli guarantee, which was never kept. Back in February 2011,
as a political gesture towards the Quartet Representative to the Middle East, the Israeli Prime Minister announced the addresses of some 5,000 Palestinians living in the West Bank, incorrectly listed in Gaza, would be changed in the Israeli copy of the Palestinian population registry. This guarantee was reiterated in the
preliminary response of the State Attorney's Office to HaMoked's petition to compel the military to update the address of three West Bank minors in its copy of the Palestinian population registry. However, to this day, Israel has only changed the addresses of only 296 Palestinians. Recall, Israel has labeled
some 35,000 Palestinians who live in the West Bank as "illegal aliens" liable for expulsion, because their registered address is in Gaza – preventing them, at the same time, from changing their address.
The water related "gesture" exposes the disquieting fact that routinely, when no "gesture" is made, Israel limits both the quantity and quality of drinking water in Gaza! HaMoked recalls that a deliberate disruption of vital supplies is not a form of economic sanctions but collective punishment against a civilian population, expressly forbidden under international law.
