An Israeli human rights group has accused the authorities of using an arbitrary, irrational tax system to enforce their rule over Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The report, published this week by Betselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, followed on the heels of the U.S. State Department’s report on human rights around the world.
That report, released in Washington on Feb. 21, bore down on Israel for the behavior of its security forces in confrontations with the local population.
Betselem’s report focused on the tax system it said was imposed without much consideration and without the option of appeal.
It pointed to a military regulation that withholds as many as 23 public services from West Bank residents until their taxes are paid.
Because most of the residents either refused to pay taxes in the past or did not keep account books, officials often set their tax levels arbitrarily, without relevance to the actual income of the taxpayer, the report said. The bargaining that follows “casts doubt on the credibility of the original assessment.”
Often an assessee has no job or works for an employer off the Israeli tax books. “Those assessees, which comprise a large part of the residents of the territories, stand helpless in the face of the assessment process,” the Betselem report said.
“They have never kept books, never filed reports, and the majority of them have never paid taxes. Usually, no negotiation takes place between the assessee and the official. The assessment is simply set.
“Those assessees usually do not appeal or bargain, and they are faced with the consequences — confiscation of documents and property or detention.”
A military spokesman, responding to the report, said it was not objective. He said the purpose of taxing residents of the territories is to provide them with “high-level services.”
Those who have grievances against the authorities have ample means to appeal them, the spokesman said.
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