Persona non grata

The Occupied Zone: An Overview 
31 
 
 
 
Human Rights Watch obtained additional testimonial evidence which 
indicates that certainly since 1988 Israeli intelligence operatives have 
interrogated Lebanese who later were expelled from the occupied zone.
32
 
 
Restrictions on Freedom of Movement 
Occupation security authorities also closely and strictly monitor and 
control the movement of all residents of Lebanon between the occupied zone and 
Lebanon proper. Passport-sized permits, which are written in Arabic and Hebrew, 
and include a photograph of the bearer, must be presented at designated SLA 
crossing points in order to leave and reenter the zone on foot.
33
 The names of 
children under fifteen years old are listed on the documents of their parents. 
According to testimony of former residents of the zone, these permits    typically 
are issued for a three-month period. Possession of a valid permit, however, does 
not necessarily guarantee that the resident will be able to leave the zone. Human 
Rights Watch interviewed former residents who had been turned away at crossing 
points even though they had obtained  permits. In other cases, some illiterate 
villagers belatedly discovered that they were expelled because they were issued 
exit documents, which they could not read, that enabled them to leave the zone 
but never return.   
                                                 
       
 32
     These cases are described in “Collective Punishment,” and “Punishing 
Refusal to Serve the Occupation Security Apparatus,” below. 
         
33
          See Appendix A for a copy of a permit issued in 1998. 

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32 
Persona Non Grata: Expulsions of Civilians from Israeli-Occupied Lebanon 
 
 
 
The arbitrary denial of permits has been used throughout the years to 
restrict freedom of movement, and to harass and put pressure on targeted 
individuals and families. As the cases in this report indicate, some husbands and 
wives have gone months and even years without seeing one another because 
occupation security officials have refused exit permits to one of the spouses. 
Human Rights Watch also documented cases in which residents requiring 
specialized medical care were denied permission to leave the zone. For women 
whose children lived outside the zone, particularly sons who fled SLA 
conscription as teenagers, the denial of exit permits was a source of tremendous 
emotional stress because of the lack of contact. For men whose professions 
required them to travel outside the zone on a regular basis in order to earn their 
livelihoods — such as traders and taxi drivers — possession of a permit 
represented an economic lifeline. Occupation security officials have used the 
threat of denial of permits as a particularly effective pressure point in the process 
of forcing some of these men to work as informers. Many who refused either fled 
the zone in fear or were expelled.
34
 
One illustrative example of restrictions on freedom of movement is a 
case from Maroun al-Ras, a small village located on a prominent hilltop at the 
southernmost end of the central section of the occupied zone, less than two 
kilometers from the Israeli border. From the testimony of former residents, the 
village’s population under the occupation has been gradually reduced to some 150 
to 200 people from three major families whose members previously numbered 
several thousand.    Fifty-eight-year-old Asadullah Hmadi and his wife were two 
of the residents who did not leave. They farmed twenty-five  dunums of land, 
earning    between LL13 to LL15 million ($8,600 to $10,000) each year from eight 
dunums that were licensed to grow tobacco.
35
  They also cultivated wheat, 
lentils, chickpeas, and other crops for their own use. Asadullah’s wife was not 
permitted to reenter the village in 1998, and he was forced to leave in 1999.         
Asadullah told Human Rights Watch that the occupation security 
authorities had denied him an exit permit for ten years, ever since he sent his 
oldest son to Beirut, when he was fourteen years old, in order to secure his safety 
from forced conscription into the SLA. Since that time, other sons also left the 
village for Beirut. In  June 1997, his youngest daughter, Hoda, at age sixteen, 
was imprisoned in Khiam, one day after her fiancé, Ghassan Eissa, was detained 
                                                 
          34         
Some of those who fled did not attempt to secure permits but left the zone on 
foot through the hills, not through SLA crossing points. 
          35         
One dunum is approximately one-quarter of an acre. 

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The Occupied Zone: An Overview 
33 
 
 
 
there.
36
  Asadullah’s wife, who previously had been issued permits to travel out of 
the zone to visit her children, suddenly encountered restrictions on her freedom of 
movement.   
“I got a    permit while my daughter was in prison, but twice they turned 
me back from the Beit Yahoun crossing.  They gave no reason,” she said. She 
then complained to Raouf Fares, the local SLA    security official, and asked for 
permission to visit her children in Beirut for fifteen days. She said that one 
evening in February 1998, Fares    sent a message, informing her to meet him in 
nearby Bint Jbail at eight o’clock the next morning and he would give  her a 
paper that would allow her to leave. She used the paper, which she could not read, 
to exit the zone. She stayed in Beirut for only ten days and then traveled back to 
the Beit Yahoun crossing:   
 
                                                 
          36         
 At the time of Human Rights Watch’s interview with the family, Ghassan 
was still detained in Khiam without charge. 

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