This article analyses the relationship between the scope of security needs that are cited as justification for restricting humanitarian assistance in situations of occupation and the scope of the occupant's obligation to facilitate and/or proactively provide humanitarian relief. It argues that, compared with a non-occupant, an occupying power may consider broader security goals as reasons to restrict humanitarian assistance, but that doing so imposes a greater responsibility on the occupying power to provide alternatives to the humanitarian assistance being restricted. In addition, as a normative matter, as increasingly long-term security goals are included in the ‘military necessity’ cited as a reason for restricting humanitarian assistance, the ambit of what is included in humanitarian assistance should be expanded to include the economic development and investment in infrastructure needed to provide for humanitarian needs in the long term. This kind of regime would enhance the self-regulation of warring powers by requiring those with the ability to engage in long-term security planning to use that ability also to provide for the long-term humanitarian needs of the civilian population. The article examines restrictions on humanitarian assistance in Gaza as an example of how this normative arrangement might work in practice.

This article challenges the idea that contextualisation of humanitarian aid affects the principle of universality of human rights as well as the principles of neutrality and impartiality. It seeks to demonstrate that contextualisation will not only improve access, delivery and protection: contextualising a mission also enables aid workers to respect the local context without impacting negatively upon universal human rights. The author argues that affecting the societies in which aid is delivered is inevitable. The key then becomes to avoid endorsing indirect cultural relativism. This is why the article puts forward the idea of creating a yardstick or a test that would help in deciding which beliefs and values are to be included when considering the context, and which should be excluded. The process of selection of values and beliefs is to be operated by an empowered local population. The filter suggested in the case at hand is the Muslim legal instrument of maslaha, which protects the public interest. The use of this filter can be efficient only if Islamic authoritative sources are interpreted differently, in a reformist fashion, to try and match universal human rights law. This is possible through the Muslim theories advocating change. Muslim beneficiaries who are vulnerable as a result of a disaster or during a conflict provide an opportunity to test the filter of maslaha, looking at how an empowered community can change and influence the agendas of aid agencies.

How can regulators keep up with sea changes in dynamic markets? This article proposes the use of competitive forces to generate innovative regulation. In markets where national, social, cultural, economic or other interests must be maintained in the face of evolving risks, heightened uncertainties and dynamic technological developments, regulators have to learn by doing.

This article proposes the novel concept of intra-regulatory competition (IRC), a powerful method for developing innovative regulatory solutions by staging a contest between different regulatory regimes imposed simultaneously on market participants in a given jurisdiction. The article describes the principles of and justifications for IRC, conditions for its effective implementation, its potential benefits and drawbacks. IRC is analysed against the backdrop of similar concepts such as randomised law, experimental law and inter-jurisdictional competition. Finally, the article argues that the regulation of media content in order to promote cultural pluralism and the regulation of computerised trading in securities and futures markets are fields that are ripe for and compatible with the application of IRC.

The phenomenon of social exclusion in Israel is a vivid demonstration of the Basic Laws' failure to fulfil their integrative role. Despite the ‘constitutional revolution’ and the Supreme Court's ongoing endeavour over the last two decades to instil a bill of rights through its jurisprudence, Israeli society has failed to fully internalise values of equality. In terms of legal jargon, individuals continue to claim and exercise ‘sole and despotic dominion’ over their private property in order to avoid contact with individuals belonging to certain minority groups. In many cases, such behaviour in the private sphere results in exclusion from the public sphere.

This phenomenon is especially astonishing considering the fact that many laws in Israel apply the right of equality to the private sphere. Furthermore, the Israeli Supreme Court has developed comprehensive human rights jurisprudence applicable to the private sphere. The gap between the law in the books and the law in action illustrates that effective implementation of human rights in the private sphere cannot be achieved solely by specific legislation or by jurisprudence that is sensitive to human rights. This argument is backed by several recent bills which preserve and enforce the exclusion of minorities, particularly of Arabs, from the public sphere. These bills illustrate that exclusion is indeed a growing phenomenon in Israeli society that cannot be overlooked. Moreover, they underscore the urgent need to entrench a direct obligation to apply human rights to the private sphere at the constitutional level. This will be achieved only when Israel adopts a full constitution.

The purpose of this article is to review the manner in which the human rights treaty bodies (HRTBs) treat Israel, focusing on the system of periodic reporting, with the aim of examining whether Israel is being accorded ‘special treatment’ or, put more simply, whether a bias against Israel can be ascertained in the work of the HRTBs. In analysing the concluding observations (COBs) issued in respect of six of Israel's recent periodic reports, we identified four distinct population groups within Israeli society, and studied the number and nature of the COBs targeting each of these groups. This we termed the ‘output’. We then looked into the amount of the alternative information provided to the Committees by civil society organisations, which we termed the ‘input’. An examination of the two reveals a clear correlation between the relatively greater weight accorded to the Palestinian population in the occupied territories in the input side of the exercise (the alternative reports) and the output side (the COBs). Thus, what might initially be perceived as proved bias in the treatment of Israel by the HRTBs in light of the seemingly disproportional weight they accord to the conflict, turns out to be at least partially influenced by the information and materials provided to the Committees.