Israeli land and property laws

Land and property laws in Israel provide the legal framework which governs land and property issues in Israel .¹ At its establishment , Israel continued to apply the pre-existing Ottoman and British land law. Over time, these laws were amended or replaced. In 1945, on the 26.4 million dunams of land in Mandate Palestine , 12.8 million was owned by Arabs, 1.5 million by Jews, 1.5 million was public land and 10.6 millions constituted the desertic Beersheba district ( Negev ). In terms of arable land, 7.8 million was owned by Arabs, 1.2 million by Jews and 0.2 million was public land. By 1949, some 700,000 Palestinians had fled or been expelled from their lands and villages. Israel was now in control of some 20.5 million dunams (approx. 20 500 km²) or 78% of lands in what had been Mandate Palestine: 8% (approx. 1,650 km²) were privately controlled by Jews, 6% (approx. 1,300 km²) by Arabs, with the remaining 86% was public land. The first challenge facing Israel was to transform its control over land into legal ownership. This was the motivation underlying the passing of several of the first group of land laws . Today, the Israel Land Administration (ILA) is responsible for managing the 93% of the land in Israel which is public land. These lands are either State property, belong to the Jewish National Fund (JNF) which controls 13% of the land. , or belong to the Israel Development Authority . This land comprises 4,820,500 acres (19,508 km ). "Ownership" of real estate in Israel usually means leasing rights from the ILA for a period of 49 or 98 years. Under Israeli law, the ILA cannot lease land to foreign nationals, which includes Palestinian residents of Jerusalem who have identity cards but are not citizens of Israel. In practice foreigners may be allowed to lease if they show that they would qualify as Jewish under the Law of Return . Conversely, the Palestinian land laws prohibit Palestinians from selling Palestinian territory lands to Jews . These land laws were originally enacted during the Jordanian occupation of the West Bank (1948–1967). A Classification of Land and Area ownership in Palestine [1] Abu Sitta, Salman (2001): From Refugees to Citizens at Home .²