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| Opening Remarks |
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reaction of the Israeli establishment to the Arab future vision
documents has been one of hysteria. Such reactions were characteristic
of colonial regimes, which viewed any challenge to their constitutional
structure, based on repression, as a strategic threat. Such was the
reaction of the Apartheid regime in the 1950s when the African National
Congress proposed the Freedom Charter, in which it demanded the
transformation of South Africa into a state of all its citizens. During
1956 many of the authors of the charter were charged with high treason.
However, in 1996, the charter became a part of the preamble of the
South African constitution. At the international level reactions to the
Arab future vision documents, which are based on international
principles regarding the rights of the citizen and human rights, have
been supportive and encouraging. The philosopher Judith Butler from the
University of California-Berkley, for example, wrote that “[Adalah’s
Democratic Constitution] proposes a systematic separation of nation and
state, and so resonates with an Arendtian politics”. Following the
publication of the draft Democratic Constitution, Adalah announced that
it would hold meetings in order to arrive at a final version of the
document. Adalah is working to establish a group made up of Palestinian
activists and academics from the homeland and the diaspora, as well as
Jewish Israeli and international experts, in order to finalize the text
of the Democratic Constitution. One of the suggestions under discussion
is the transformation of the draft into a democratic constitution for a
supranational regime in all of historic Palestine. The European
Convention on Human Rights will provide a useful model in this
discussion. Bringing together this group will be one of the activities
undertaken by Adalah in preparation for the sixtieth year of the Nakba
in 2008. |
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| Nakba 60
Anniversary |
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Adalah’s Newsletter is a monthly publication issued in Arabic, Hebrew
and English. It highlights Adalah’s main activities, provides analysis
of human rights issues, and links to new reports. Suggestions, articles
and commentaries from our readers are welcome.
