Israel sets new precedent as it prepares to strip Palestinian-Israeli of citizenship

According to legal sources, Haifa district court decided on Sunday to revoke Alaa Zayoud’s citizenship by applying a 2008 law that allows the interior ministry to deprive those involved in “terrorist activities” of their nationality.

The 22-year-old is the son of a Palestinian-Israeli mother and a Palestinian father with permanent residency in Israel.

Adalah, an Palestinian-Israeli rights group, said the decision was the first of its kind.

Zayoud was convicted on four counts of attempted murder after ploughing a car into Israeli soldiers and stabbing civilians in Octobe 2015.

An Israeli court sentenced him to 25 years in prison in 2016.

Adalah and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel said in a joint statement said they will appeal the verdict in Israel’s supreme court.

They rights groups said the court decision deviated “from the principles of international law, and from the general rule according to which an individual cannot be stripped of (their) citizenship and left stateless”.

A wave of violence that began in October 2015 has seen more than 290 Palestinian from the occupied territories or Palestinian-Israelis and 47 Israelis killed, according to an AFP toll.

Israel has been criticised by international rights groups over how it has dealt with Arab attackers, including for enacting policies of collective punishment by demolishing the family homes of suspected militants.