Israel’s High Court of Justice dealt a setback Tuesday to four Palestinian activists appealing deportation orders.
The justices denied a request by their lawyers, Leah Tsemel and Linda Bryer, for access to the classified information that supported the deportation orders signed March 23 by Maj. Gen. Mattan Vilnai, the Israel Defense Force commander in the southern region.
The Palestinians, all from the Gaza Strip, are alleged to be hard-core terrorists associated with Al Fatah, the largest faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
They were not charged with security offenses. But according to the IDF, their activism created a climate that encouraged Arab violence against Jews, such as the recent spate of random stabbings.
Tsemel and Bryer had asked to compare the classified with the unclassified material used against their clients to see if it was proportional in amount and importance.
The state prosecutor argued that the four activists must be deported because other measures taken against them including administrative detention — incarceration without trial — were ineffective.
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