Executive Summary
the State of Palestine. ICHR further recommends that the security agencies
and MOI abide by the provisions of Law No. 12 of 1998 on Public Meetings
and the Public Prosecution and the judiciary immediately to investigate
any incident that undermines the right to peaceful assembly in the State
of Palestine, and to hold accountable any person who has been proven
to assault the participants in peaceful assemblies or use excessive force
contrary to the instructions.
2.1.7 The Right to Freedom of Association
The Cabinet cancelled the condition requiring the founders of associations
to receive a financial acquittal certificate, which is one of the illegal
restrictions in force since 2012 that hinder the registration of associations.
However, the Cabinet continued subjecting applications to register
associations to security checks by the security agencies, a procedure that is
not stipulated in the Law concerning the Associations and its implementing
regulations and it violates the Cabinet resolution cancelling the security
clearance condition, as well as the judgment rendered by the High Court
on the case of public servants in 2012 which deemed the condition of
security clearance as a violation of the Basic Law.
Funding of the nonprofit companies is still monitored by the Cabinet.
Such nonprofit companies include the nongovernmental human rights
organizations, based on the Cabinet resolution No. 3 of 2010 concerning the
Regulations as to Nonprofit Companies, as amended, which compromised
the functioning of many nongovernmental organizations that operate in
Palestine, which called for cancelling of such condition in more than one
occasion, because it represents an interference by the executive authority
in the functioning of the nongovernmental organizations and violates
the recommendations of the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights
Defenders who considered funding of the civil society organizations as an
essential element to safeguard to right to freedom of assembly and the free
action of the civil society organizations. In 2017, the Decree-Law No. 11
of 2017 concerning regulation of the right to conduct strike in public posts
was issued and it banned public servants in some professional sectors from
conducting strikes, which constituted a restriction on the right to conduct
strike and the freedom of union action.
The Independent Commission for Human Rights (ICHR)
27