Summary
Israel’s Entry into Israel Law, 5712-1952, passed 26 August 1952, as printed in an unofficial consolidation through the 1985 Amendment 4: entry and residence for everyone other than an Israel national, and residence for an oleh’s visa or certificate holder, run through ministerial visas and four residence-permit categories, frontier-station control, a one-year offence for unlawful entry or residence, and a ministerial deportation power over a non-national, non-oleh without a permit (Entry into Israel Law, 5712-1952 (1952), PDF p.1-5).
Details
- Entry and residence (sections 1-6, PDF p.1-2): entry only by oleh’s visa or a visa under this Law; residence only by permit, in transitory (up to 5 days), visitor’s (up to 3 months), temporary (up to 3 years) and permanent categories, with stated extension caps, substitution, return visas and ministerial conditions, all as “may” powers of the Minister of the Interior.
- Frontier procedure (sections 7-10, PDF p.2): entry only at prescribed frontier stations with a passport or laissez-passer; carrier lists and inspection; delay of entry pending verification; detention and carrier removal of a person not permitted to enter.
- Cancellation, offences and deportation (sections 11-13, PDF p.3): the Minister may cancel any visa or permit at his discretion and, by reasoned decision, an oleh’s visa or certificate obtained by false information; unlawful entry or residence, false information, breach of conditions and any other contravention are punishable by one year’s imprisonment; a non-national, non-oleh in Israel without a permit may be deported by ministerial order, detained until departure, and charged, or his non-permitted employer charged, with the cost.
- Exemptions and transition (sections 17-18, PDF p.4-5): diplomatic and service entrants are outside the Law, with further exempt categories by order; a person who entered before the Law remains in the position as if it had not been enacted unless granted a permanent permit; section 18(c) allows the Minister to grant a return visa, on application within two years of the Law’s coming into force, to a person who was an inhabitant on 29 November 1947 of an area that became Israel territory and had left that area before that date, as printed.
- Repeal (section 19, PDF p.5): the Immigration Ordinance, 1941 is repealed, its rules, orders, notices and grants preserved as if under this Law.
- Consolidation limit: the file’s Comments (PDF p.5) state this is an unofficial consolidation including Amendment 4 of 1985, with 1994, 1995 and 1996 amendments untranslated, and no section is marked as amended, so no section’s 1952 wording can be separated from later wording on this file alone.
Where sources disagree
- The Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law (2003) recorded in Stateless Citizenship (2013) (PDF p.83, footnote 32), a temporary order denying Palestinian citizens status for Palestinian spouses from the OPT, is a later, distinct enactment sharing this Law’s entry frame; it is not this 1952 Law, and the two are kept separate. In its primary text (Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law (temporary provision), 5763-2003 (2003), PDF p.1-2), that Law bars the Minister of the Interior, for as long as it remains in force, from giving an inhabitant of Judea and Samaria or the Gaza Strip (Israeli settlement inhabitants excluded) a license to reside in Israel on the basis of this Law, subject to its section 3 reservations and section 4 transition rules.
Related pages
Entry into Israel Law, 5712-1952 (1952), Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law (temporary provision), 5763-2003, Law of Return, Citizenship Law (1952), Knesset