2024 RLLR 49

Citation: 2024 RLLR 49
Tribunal: Refugee Protection Division
Date of Decision: April 10, 2024
Panel: Roderick Flynn
Counsel for the Claimant(s): Alaa Abu-Hijleh
Country: Israel
RPD Number: TC3-22991
Associated RPD Number(s): N/A
ATIP Number: A-2025-00128
ATIP Pages: N/A

DECISION

[1] MEMBER: This is a decision in the claim for refugee protection made by XXXX XXXX XXXX a citizen of Israel who is claiming refugee protection pursuant to section 96 and 97(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, otherwise known as the IRPA.

DETERMINATION

[2] Based on all the evidence before me, I find you be a Convention refugee pursuant to section 96 of the IRPA, connected to your cumulative profile as a woman who has rejected Islam and who faces family and honour-based violence in Israel. In summary, the allegations in this matter as follows.

[3] You describe that you are a woman from a Bedouin tribe — resident in southern Israel. You fear persecution and harm from your family members, and particularly your brothers and cousins in Israel, connected to your long-standing rejection of your cultural’s (sic) traditional values and beliefs, and roles for women, and specifically, your 2021 rejection of your family’s decision to endorse your marriage to your cousin. You have described that your life and behaviour were very tightly controlled throughout most of your life in Israel, and you endured multiple incidents of abuse without consequences to the people who committed these crimes.

[4] You have outlined that things escalated significantly after your cousin invaded your workplace during the XXXX of 2021, directing you to stop work and effectively just marry and live with him. You have detailed that you escaped from Israel, promising to marry your cousin, and by attending at your XXXX degree, and you used this opportunity by — provided by your university attendance, to flee to Germany. After your family had tracked you to Germany, and requested to meet you, you fled to Canada and sought refugee protection.

[5] On the matter of identity. Your personal identity as a citizen of Israel has been established by your credible testimony, your copy of your passport, and other identity documents which have been entered as exhibits at our hearing.

[6] I therefore find, on a balance of probabilities, that identity and country of reference, Israel, have been established.

[7] While you stayed in Germany for a number of months, I am not convinced you have any remaining status there. Accordingly, your claim will be assessed against your country of reference of Israel

Nexus

[8] I find there is a link between your subjective fear in Israel and your cumulative gender and religious profile as someone who has rejected Islam, and identifies as an atheist/agnostic. Therefore, your claim is being assessed under section 96 of the IRPA

Credibility

[9] I find you to be a very credible and consistent witness. You shared with me openly and without hesitation how your life is in jeopardy in Israel, why it is in jeopardy in Israel, and how culturally your death as ostensible punishment for shaming the family by leaving them for Germany, among other reasons, is seen as somehow cleansing the family honour. You spoke clearly, candidly, and without hesitation on the many difficult topics that we covered in our hearing, and there were no major inconsistencies between your oral evidence and your Basis of Claim or narrative.

[10] Given this finding of credibility on your testimony, I therefore believe what you have alleged in your Basis of Claim form and narrative, that your life is at risk from honour killing in Israel, from the family — your family, or members of your tribe. You have provided a wealth of credible supporting documentation for your claim, including identity documents, education documents, copies of your various requests for help to many different sources, including women’s advocates, lawyers, and embassy officials, as well as the German police, recordings of the death threats to you from your cousin and two (2) brothers, various letters of support from various sources, and a series of photographs.

[11] Based upon the evidence provided, I find your subjective fear, based upon your cumulative gender and religious profiles, established by your credible testimony and supporting documentary evidence.

Objective Evidence

[12] The documentary evidence from the National Documentation Package, hereinafter referred to as NDP, for Israel, and the objective evidence sent by your Counsel, supports your credible subjective fear. Item 13.1of the NDP For Israel confirms your evidence about the nature and location of the Bedouin community in Israel and its traditions. This article also discusses, at page 2, that Bedouin women and girls are among the most disadvantaged and vulnerable groups in Israel within the greater Bedouin community, which has been named itself the most impoverished group in Israel. Just as you testified Item 1.13 of the NDP also strongly support your oral evidence that women from Bedouin and other minority communities face significant social pressure not to report gender-based violence. This article states clearly that honour-based killings are, “Particularly present in Arab and Bedouin communities.” That is at page 6. Item 5.9 of the NDP summarizes that over the last 10 years, the number of femicides in Israel has risen sharply, connected to, “Patriarchal social structures that perpetuate women’s inferiority and subordination.”

[13] The abundance of articles provided by our Council also speak to a series of gender-based killings and assaults in Israel, and within the Bedouin community there, most of them occurring quite recently. Based upon this strongly — this strong supporting objective evidence, I find your subjective fear of persecution and harm in Israel is well-founded

State Protection

[14] Item 5.9 of the NDP documents plainly that state protection from gender-based violence in Israel is inadequate, particularly to women of Arabic origin such as yourself. This article records that, just as you address in your oral testimony, 50 percent of the femicide victims in Israel between 2011 and 2020, were known to authorities prior to their murder, with 33 percent of them making explicit police reports prior to their demise. This article describes the phenomena as showing a, “Disturbing reality of faulty police work.”

[15] Item 5.9 at page 5 states explicitly that the shortfalls in state protection to women in Israel are particularly connected to Arabic communities. This article identifies these failures are linked to greater issues of lack of service and discrimination to Arabic communities within the country. Based upon the strong objective evidence, I find that the presumption of state protection is rebutted in your case.

Internal Flight Alternative

[16] The dangerous situation for women in Israel applies throughout the country. I find on the evidence before me, including the objective evidence, there is no place within Israel where you could reasonably and safely relocate. The evidence before me shows that clearly your family is — including your brothers and cousin, are clearly motivated to find you, and they have already shown the means to track you within the small country of Israel, having successfully located you outside the country in Germany. Further, I believe your evidence that given your mom’s origins in the north of the country, and your family’s presence in the south, the small area of the country of Israel itself makes it very difficult, in any event, for you to avoid discovery if you were to return. Therefore, I find on a balance of probabilities, there is no viable internal flight alternative for you in Israel.

CONCLUSION

[17] In conclusion, I find, on a balance of probabilities, you face a serious possibility of persecution in Israel based upon your cumulative gender and religious profile, without a viable internal flight alternative or adequate state protection, and I accept your claim.

——— REASONS CONCLUDED ———