Israeli cabinet backs broadened stop-and-search powers

Israeli police may soon have the power to stop and search people even if they are not posing a clear threat or suspected of carrying a weapon.

On Monday, the Israeli Ministerial Committee for Legislation approved a bill which would give new stop-and-search powers to the police, moving on Monday night to the Knesset for its first reading.

First proposed in 2011, the bill was originally aimed at clamping down on violence in Israeli nightclubs and pubs, but was stalled after its first reading.

A current law on the books only allows police to search someone if there is reasonable suspicion that a person is carrying a weapon or another object that could be used to commit a crime.

But last week, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said he intended to make use of the bill to combat the current wave of Palestinian knife attacks.

Although the nightclubs and pubs, for example, would need to hang a sign at their entrance to warn patrons that they could be frisked by police under the bill, it also has a clause that would allow police to temporarily declare a place where searches can occur including locations where there is a "real fear" of violent crimes or "special security risks", Haaretz reported.

This has raised questions about whether all of Jerusalem, for example, could be declared as an area where people could be stopped and searched. Haaretz suggested that Erdan would interpret the law to allow for such scope.

Avner Pinchuk, an attorney with the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, condemned the bill, describing it as permitting police to carry out “invasive searches” with no justification.

“This is a measure the Public Security Ministry has been trying to pass for years on various pretexts, in order to legitimise a police practice that has been disqualified by the courts and which, in practice, will be used against people with dark skins and a Mizrahi appearance,” he said, referring to Jews of Middle Eastern origin.

The bill comes less than a week after the Israeli cabinet approved new security measures, in the wake of increased violence, that have seen East Jerusalem neigbourhoods where Palestinian citizens of Israel live sealed off from car traffic.

Locals on the outskirts of Jerusalem's Old City have told MEE that the police presence in the area, including those on corners and snipers on rooftops, is unprecedented.