Al-Haq

Introduction

Profile

Country/TerritoryPalestinian Authority
Websitehttp://www.alhaq.org/
Founded1979
In their own wordsClaims to document “violations of the individual and collective rights of Palestinians in the OPT” and “end such breaches by way of advocacy before national and international mechanisms and by holding the violators accountable.”

Funding

Activities

  • Leader in anti-Israel “lawfare” and BDS (boycotts, divestments and sanctions) campaigns.
  • Was an active participant in the 2001 Durban World Conference against Racism, which adopted the strategy of promoting the complete international isolation and demonization of Israel through boycotts, legal attacks, and other forms of political warfare.
  • In January 2020, Palestinian NGO Network (PNGO), of which Al-Haq is a member, vehemently opposed a new clause in European Union grant contracts with Palestinian NGOs that prohibits grantees from working with and funding organizations and individuals designated on the EU’s terror lists. According to media reports, PNGO claimed that Palestinian terrorist organizations are “political parties.”
    • On January 2, 2020, Al-Haq’s General Director Shawan Jabarin published a letter, “I Write to Resist,” criticizing and belittling the importance of the EU’s anti-terrorism clause by stating that the “newly added clause, commonly referred to as an anti-terrorism clause…could undermine the ability of Palestinian civil society organizations to engage with Palestinian society.” Jabarin further implied that Israel naming its main airport after David Ben Gurion, Israel’s founding Prime Minister, “inspires (or incites) [] violent settler groups to act on the premise that the ends justify the means.”

Ties to the PFLP

Apartheid Rhetoric

  • Al-Haq is part of a network of NGOs that promote artificial and manufactured definitions of apartheid to extend the ongoing campaigns that seek to delegitimize and demonize Israel. (Read NGO Monitor’s Policy Paper “False Knowledge as Power: Deconstructing Definitions of Apartheid that Delegitimise the Jewish State.”)
  • In February 2023, Al-Haq, alongside Addameer and Al Mezan, published a submission to the UN Human Rights Council’s permanent “Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and in Israel” (COI) accusing Israel of “Policies to Maintain and Entrench its Settler-Colonial Apartheid Regime: Violent Suppression of Demonstrations and Ensuing Wilful Killing and Injuries, Arbitrary Detention, Torture, and Smear and Delegitimisation Campaigns against Human Rights Defenders and Organisations.” In their submission, in addition to the false accusations regarding Israel, the NGOs whitewash acts of violence by Palestinians, omitting core evidence linking Palestinians to terrorist organizations.  
  • In September 2022, Al-Haq was a signatory on a call to the UN General Assembly to “Take Immediate and Effective Action to End Israel’s Apartheid Against Palestinians.”   According to the call, “Dismantling Israel’s system of apartheid against Palestinians must be central to the UN’s commitment to end racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance worldwide.”
  • In January 2022, Al-Haq, alongside Habitat International Coalition and Addameer, submitted a joint report to then UN Special Rapporteur Michael Lynk claiming that “since its inception, the centrality of the racial dimension of Zionism has formed the foundation of Israel’s ever-lasting institutionalised racial discrimination and apartheid regime.” The NGOs called for the international community and the United Nations to “Recognize and condemn Israeli apartheid against the Palestinian people; discharge their duty of nonrecognition and take effective measures, including stopping arms trade.”
  • In April 2021, Al-Haq was a signatory on a joint submission to the UN Secretary-General on Intimidation and Reprisals for Cooperation with the UN, stating that “Since its establishment, Israel has created and maintained an institutionalised regime of racial domination and oppression, amounting to apartheid, over the Palestinian people as a whole…Israel has sought to fundamentally undermine key human rights and accountability work and thereby further entrenched impunity for its apartheid regime over Palestinians” (emphasis added).

Political Advocacy

  • In August 2022, following criticism against the UN HRC’s permanent Commission of Inquiry’s use of antisemitic rhetoric, Al-Haq signed a joint statement “extend[ing] their full support and pledg[ing] their ongoing cooperation with the UN Commission of Inquiry on Palestine.” The statement affirmed that “the present Commission is a crucial step toward the recognition and remedy of Israel’s settler-colonial and apartheid regime as the root cause of Israel’s perpetual violations of international law in Palestine.”
    • In July 2022, Commissioner Miloon Kothari made antisemitic comments on a podcast, claiming that the “Jewish lobby” controls social media and questioned whether Israel should have UN membership. In a letter to UNHRC President Federico Villegas, Commissioner Navi Pillay refused to condemn Kothari’s remarks, stating his comments “have deliberately been taken out of context…[and] deliberately misquoted.” Dozens of countries, UN Special Rapporteur Ahmed Shaheed, and HRC President Federico Villegas condemned these remarks.
  • In May 2022, Al-Haq was a signatory to a flagrantly antisemitic report submitted to the UN HRC’s permanent Commission of Inquiry against Israel. The submission presented a blatantly false historical account that denied Israel’s right to exist, categorized Israel’s very existence as illegal, and labeled Zionism as a form of racism, demanding that the Commission “Recognise and Address Zionist Settler Colonialism and Apartheid as the Root Causes of Israel’s Ongoing Violations.”
  • In May 2022, Al-Haq was a signatory on a petition titled “The Return Appeal” calling on the United Nations to “take all necessary steps and measures for immediately holding the occupation’s state accountable for all the crimes, the latter has so far committed against the Palestinian people, within strict legal means that would not allow the occupation’s criminals to evade interrogation or possible trials.”
  • In April 2021, Al-Haq Head of Legal Research and Advocacy Susan Power published a paper titled “The Legal Architecture of Apartheid.” According to the paper, “The State of Israel seeks to justify this discriminatory practice by claiming that Palestinians abuse their basic rights by engaging in and facilitating terrorist activity.  These laws, and their associated justifications and practices, are the legal basis of Israel’s apartheid regime.”
  • In February 2021, Al-Haq published a joint policy paper titled “United States Policy on Palestine: 2021 and Beyond” calling for the “US to reevaluate its past blanket support of Israel” and “end the decades long environment of impunity that it has enabled for Israel to entrench its settler colonization and apartheid in the Palestinian territory.” The policy calls to “ban the import of all Israeli settlement products and services” and “End all military aid to Israel.”
  • In February 2021, Al-Haq, together with Forensic Architecturealleged that Israeli forces acted unlawfully in shooting Ahmed Erekat when he rammed his car into a soldier at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Jerusalem in June 2020. The NGOs did not offer new or concrete evidence, and did not know and could not incorporate the assessments of the Israeli forces on the ground. (Read NGO Monitor’s report “EU-Funded, ICC-Linked Al-Haq and Forensic Architecture on the Ahmad Erekat Shooting.”)
  • In January 2021, sent a letter to Pfizer “expressing concern at Israel’s racially discriminatory exclusion of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip from its vaccination efforts.” In the letter, Al-Haq urged Pfizer to “ensure that its vaccine is not used to contribute to adverse human rights impacts, or to reinforce and further entrench the unlawful situation in Palestine as it stands.”
    • Al-Haq falsely claimed that Israel has legal obligations to ensure that vaccines be provided to Palestinians, while altogether ignoring that Palestinians residing in Jerusalem are part of the Israeli health care system; that under the Oslo Accords the PA is responsible for health care of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza; and that the PA has adopted its own vaccine policy for its population.
  • In September 2019, Al-Haq, alongside Al-Marsad, submitted a report to the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights alleging that “Israel illegally exploits energy resources” and “governs the OPT and Golan in a sovereign-like manner, permanently alienating public immoveable land and natural resources.”
  • In July 2019, Al-Haq held a side event at the 41st session of the Human Rights Council on “Climate and Environmental Justice in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” At the event, Suha Jarrar, Environmental and Gender Policy Researcher at Al-Haq and daughter of PFLP leader Khalida Jarrar, placed sole blame on Israel for climate change, stating that “the majority of environmental problems are the result of Israel’s occupation and not climate change…scientific proof shows that climate change is not yet impacting Palestine…the major obstacle for water availability is Israel and Mekorot not climate change…”
  • On May 18, 2019, Al-Haq was a signatory on a statement referring to all of Jerusalem as “occupied,” and called for the UN to “take a firm stand against…unlawful unilateral measures to be taken by the U.S. in favor of an unveiled attempt at legitimizing Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise, occupation and colonization.” The statement further called to “Ban Israeli settlement products” and “Impose individual sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, on individuals that are identified as responsible for or complicit in the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity.”

Lawfare

  • Regularly files lawsuits and submits politically motivated reports to the UN Human Rights Council and other international bodies.
  • Proposed sabotaging the Israeli court system by “flooding the [Israeli Supreme] Court with petitions in the hope of obstructing its functioning and resources.”
  • On November 28, 2022, Al-Haq and 197 other regional and international civil society organizations sent an open letter to ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan urging him to “Investigate and Deter Israel’s Apartheid Regime.” According to the letter, “Though mindful of the Court’s limited resources and budgetary complications, as well as your office workload and challenges, we are compelled to stress that Palestinian victims deserve justice and require equal attention as in other situations…we will continue our cooperation with your office and our support of your investigation into the Situation in the State of Palestine.”
  • In September 2022, as a member of the Don’t Buy Into Occupation campaign, jointly published a report calling on European governments to “Fully cooperate with the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), in line with relevant obligations set forth in the Rome Statute and the Geneva Conventions; and express public support for the independence of the Court in its investigation into the Situation in Palestine, which could encompass private and corporate actors.”
  • On February 6, 2021, following the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber Iruling that the Court has jurisdiction to investigate alleged war crimes in the Palestinian territories, Al-Haq, alongside Al-Mezan, and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), published a press release stating, “…it is imperative that the Prosecutor include acts of apartheid in the scope of her investigation…The decision confirmed the State of Palestine… as a full and legitimate State Party to the Rome Statute, and the entirety of the oPt as within the scope of territorial jurisdiction for investigation into international crimes…” (emphasis added). The organizations stressed that they will continue their “tireless” cooperation with the ICC, having submitted “six substantial communications and thousands of eyewitness files to the Office of the Prosecutor…”
  • In July 2019, on the 15th anniversary of the International Court of Justice’s advisory opinion against Israel’s Security Barrier, Al-Haq published a statement saying that “the weak responses by third States have effectively given Israel a carte blanche, to remove and erase Palestinian presence in order to transfer in Israeli Jews to Judaize the territory. Meanwhile the prolonged occupation has taken on a permanent and illegal character and the situation now represents a colonisation, annexation, occupation and apartheid” (emphasis added).
  • In October 2018, Al-Haq, alongside Al Mezan and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), submitted to the International Criminal Court prosecutor a report accusing Israel of “extracting and destroying Palestinian natural resources.”  According to Shawan Jabarin, “Israelis and private actors have been deliberately and openly exploiting Palestinian natural resources for at least five decades. The exploitation of Palestinian natural resources by Israel, Israelis, as well as corporations, finances and thereby sustains and allows for the expansion of Israeli settlements, including by providing profitable employment to settlers and a secure living environment.”
  • Al-Haq has submitted various documents to the International Criminal Court (ICC).
    • In March 2020, alongside Al-Mezan, Al-Dameer, and Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), Al-Haq submitted an amicus brief “welcom[ing[ and support[ing] the findings of the Prosecutor that there is a reasonable basis to believe that international crimes have been committed in the occupied Palestinian territory, comprising the West Bank, including East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.”
    • In December 2017, Al-Haq, Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), Al Mezan, and Al-Dameer submitted a document to the Prosecutor of the ICC  examining “Israel’s inability and unwillingness to conduct effective investigations ” and called for “investigation into the serious international crimes committed during the July-August 2014 Israeli military offensive.”
    • On September 20, 2017, these NGOs submitted a “substantive communication” to the Prosecutor of the ICC alleging that “high-level Israeli civilian and military officials have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in the occupied West Bank including East Jerusalem.”
    • On November 22, 2016, the four NGOs delivered a submission to the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, “Requesting Investigation and Prosecution of The Illegal Closure of the Gaza Strip.”
    • In February 2016, the NGOs “provided evidence of the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity” and concluded that “high-ranking Israeli military and civilian officials committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during Operation Protective Edge.”
    • On November 23, 2015, the four NGOs submitted a document claiming evidence and testimonies of alleged Israeli “war crimes” perpetrated during the 2014 Gaza war.
  • On May 14, 2016, Shawan Jabarin spoke at the “Malaga Legal Experts Conference,” organized by the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), aimed at “reviewing all efforts relevant to employing the principle of Universal Jurisdiction to prosecute Israeli war criminals and how these efforts relate to action before the ICC.”
  • In 2010, filed a criminal complaint against the Dutch company, Riwal, for alleged complicity “in the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity.” The complaint was dismissed in May 2013.
  • Supported the December 2009 arrest warrant secured in the UK by Hamas against Israeli opposition leader and former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, claiming she bore “special responsibility for the war crimes and possible crimes against humanity that characterized Israel’s actions during the assault on Gaza.”
  • Worked with Al Mezan to secure an arrest warrant in the UK against Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak in September 2009.
  • In 2008, Al-Haq, alongside the Bil’in Village Council, filed a lawsuitBil’in (Village Council) v. Green Park International Ltd. (Quebec, Canada 2008) accusing a Canadian company of “aiding, abetting, assisting and conspiring with the State of Israel” to commit “war crimes.” Canadian courts dismissed this case and imposed costs on the plaintiffs.
  • In 2006, filed a case against the British government to end export licenses to Israel; it was dismissed by the UK Court of Appeal in 2008.  A similar case filed in 2009 was also dismissed in the preliminary stages.

BDS Activities

  • In September 2022, Al-Haq was a signatory on a letter to the European Union to “review its decision to revive the Association Council Meeting, stop the recently signed gas deal and review its bilateral cooperation programmes.” According to the call, “Instead of allowing Israel to entrench its colonial enterprise and apartheid regime, rewarding it with further economic cooperation and trade of harmful military equipment and technologies, the EU and its Member States have an obligation, and interest, to hold Israel accountable and put an end to impunity.”
  • In February 2022, Al-Haq participated in a campaign titled “#StopTradeWithSettlements” calling “for an EU law that will end trade with illegal settlements once and for all.”
  • In December 2021, at a conference held by the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (CEIRPP) opposing Israel’s declaring six NGOs, including Al-Haq, as terror organizations, Al-Haq Business and Human Rights Program Coordinator Wesam Ahmad stated that “The international community must respond with a systemic counter response that addresses Israel’s actions in various levels…We have to show that everything is connected. Supporting the process at the ICC, taking measures to ban settlement products, supports of the UN database on business enterprises involved in the settlement enterprise. These are all actions we have been calling for. The response to attempts to silence us should be met with the implementation of these calls” (emphasis added).
  • In August 2021, Al-Haq signed a letter to the States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty calling to “put an end to Israel’s notorious use of arms and military equipment…by immediately imposing a comprehensive two-way arms embargo on Israel.” According to the letter, “This systematic brutality, perpetrated throughout the past seven decades of Israel’s colonialism, apartheid, pro-longed illegal belligerent occupation, persecution, and closure, is only possible because of the complicity of some governments and corporations around the world.”
  • In June 2021, Al-Haq was a signatory on a letter to President Biden to “Halt Weapons Sales to Israel.”
  • In May 2021, Al-Haq was a signatory on a statement calling to “Ban arms trade and military-security cooperation with Israel,” “Suspend free-trade agreements with Israel,” and “Ensure that individuals and corporate actors responsible for war crimes/crimes against humanity in the context of Israel’s regime of illegal occupation and apartheid are brought to justice.”
  • In 2018-2020, Al-Haq lobbied intensively in support of the discriminatory UN database of businesses operating across the 1949 Armistice line, aimed at bolstering BDS campaigns against Israel. Al-Haq has signed multiple letters to the UN calling for the database to be implemented without further delay.
  • In May 2020, Al-Haq was a signatory on a statement calling for “Immediate targeted sanctions to stop Israel’s annexation and apartheid.” The statement further called for “A ban on arms trade and military-security cooperation with Israel,” “Suspension of trade and cooperation agreements with Israel,” and “Investigation and prosecution of individuals and corporate actors responsible for war crimes/crimes against humanity in the context of Israel’s regime of illegal occupation and apartheid.”
  • In April 2020, Al-Haq and the Global Legal Action Network (GLAN, Ireland) published a report titled “Business and Human Rights in Occupied Territory: A Guidance for Upholding Human Rights” presenting a prejudicial account of business activity in the West Bank and implicitly demanding that States impose sanctions on Israel.
  • In July 2019, Al-Haq called for the Canadian government to “take a stance against Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise, in line with Canada’s obligations under international law including not to recognise, give effect or assist an unlawful situation, by banning trade in settlement products and services entirely.” Al-Haq further called for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to “adopt labels for settlement-made products which accurately allow consumers to exercise their right to buy conscientiously and make informed decisions.”
  • In May 2019, Al-Haq was a signatory on a statement calling on the German Bundestag to revoke its joint resolution defining BDS campaigns against Israel as antisemitic.
  • In February 2019, Al-Haq was a signatory on a letter to the United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund calling to refrain from investing money in “Israel’s unlawful settlement enterprise.” According to the letter, “corporations may be complicit in aiding and abetting the destruction of property and forcible displacement of the Palestinian population, amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
  • In January 2019, Al-Haq supported the Irish “Control of Economic Activity (Occupied territories)” bill which would make it illegal for Irish citizens and residents to import or sell “settlement goods” or to provide or attempt to provide “settlement services.”
  • In June 2018, Al-Haq, alongside the French League of Human Rights (LDH), International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH), and the Platform of French NGOs for Palestine (PFP), published a report, “The Jerusalem light-rail and how French companies contribute to the settlement of Occupied Palestinian Territory,” despite French court rulings that building the Jerusalem Light Rail is not illegal. The report calls for French companies Systra, Egis, and Alstom  to “terminate their contracts with the Israeli authorities” and urged the French State “to take all the measures needed to ensure that the three public operators, SNCF, RATP and CDC, terminate the contracts signed in the context of the implementation of the Jerusalem tramway, by the companies they control, SYSTRA and Egis; and to take all the measure needed to prevent any participation or investment by French companies that would contribute to Israeli settlement.”
    • Following the report, Al-Haq published a press release “salut[ing]” the announcement by the CEO of SNCF that “Systra is withdrawing from the red and purple line of the Jerusalem light-rail” and referring to it as “a first victory on a just path.”
  • In May 2018, Al-Haq was a signatory on a letter to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to “Investigate Israel’s Use of Lethal Force in Gaza.” The letter accused Israel of using American weapons against Palestinian demonstrators and called to “halt any further assistance to all Israeli military units involved in these shootings.” The letter ignored the violent nature of the protests, which have consisted of an organized armed attack on the Israeli border and IDF positions, attempts to destroy and breach the border fence, and sustained arson, rocket, and mortar attacks on Israeli civilian communities.
  • In March 2017, Al-Haq, along with groups including International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH),  Association France Palestine Solidarité (AFPS), CCFD- Terre Solidaire, and the French League of Human Rights (LDH) published a document ‘The dangerous ties between French banks and insurances companies with the Israeli occupation‘, which recommended that the French government pressure French financial institutions to “disengage without delay from any financial link with the Israeli banking system,” and create “a legislative proposal prohibiting enterprises from all sectors to invest in the settlements.”

Staff

  • Wesam Ahmad
    • At a June 2017 CEIRPP conference, “United Nations Forum to Mark Fifty Years of Occupation,” Wesam Ahmad, Al-Haq Program Assistant, remarked that Israel “was a colonial project from the very beginning and in fact Israel has been able to benefit from the historical colonial practices to develop what I call ‘best business practice model of colonization’.” (Video of this statement available on UN Web TV, at 1:29:22)
    • In March 2014, Ahmad participated in a conference held by the University of Amsterdam on the topic of the “role of the European Union in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the case of businesses invested in illegal settlements, labelling settlement products and EU’s commitments to respect and promote human rights.”
    • In July 2013, Ahmad told the Financial Times that “In our opinion it is not sufficient for the European Commission to punt responsibility to the consumer…The Europeans have obligations under international law to prohibit these goods by banning them from entering the market.”
  • Raja Shehadeh
    • Shehadeh is a founder of Al-Haq and a member of Military Court Watch’s advisory board.
    • On March 20, 2017, spoke at SOAS on “Is Israel afraid of peace? Reflections on the failures of international law and human rights, and on sources of hope.” Shehadeh spoke about how it “is almost 50 years since the Six-Day War. The end of those hostilities witnessed the Israeli occupation of former Palestinian territories in the West Bank and Gaza, and the displacement of 300,000 Palestinian citizens. After half a century of devastating regional conflicts a resolution to the situation appears no closer.”
    • In a 2012 interview with the ICRC, Shehadeh stated that “the occupation is of a colonial nature. Its aim ultimately is to encourage – certainly not by using force – the Palestinians to leave and to be replaced by Israeli settlers.” He furthered that a structure was introduced to “resolve the problem of how to apply Israeli laws to one part of the population and not to the other, and how to discriminate in an official, ‘legal’ manner between the two groups of inhabitants living on the same territory. This was how apartheid was introduced to the OPT.”
    • According to Shehadeh, “we cannot speak about the occupation without speaking about the settlements and the fact that people do not see Israel only as an occupier that controls certain aspects of their lives, but as a colonizer that is after their land. It feels like a cancerous growth that is eating up their body and making normal life impossible in every way.”
  • Jonathan Kuttab
    • A member of Al-Haq’s General Assembly and Board of Directors, Kuttab also serves on the board of Sabeel.
    • Kuttab has advocated for a “one-state solution” to the Arab-Israeli conflict, which seeks to eliminate Jewish self-determination. In December 2017, Kuttab gave a lecture titled “A Vision for One State in Israel/Palestine.” In 2009, Kuttab, wrote an article stating that “Zionism will ultimately need to redefine its goals and aspirations, this time without ignoring or seeking to dispossess the indigenous Palestinian population. Palestinians will also have to deal with this reality, and accept — even enthusiastically endorse — the elements required to make Jews truly feel at peace in the single new state that will be the home of both people.”
    • In September 2015, Kuttab participated in a conference titled “Waging Peace: Doing Justice Through BDS,” speaking about “Why should BDS be considered a strategy for doing justice in the Holy Land?” He will share BDS history, principles, variety, effectiveness, its use in the occupied territories, and as a strategy being used by churches, and peace/justice organizations.”
  • In December 2010, Maureen Claire Murphy, managing editor of Electronic Intifada and a former Al-Haq employee, was subpoenaed by the FBI to appear before a Federal Grand Jury for her work with the Palestine Solidarity Group.

Partners

Al-Haq Funders (2014-2021)

FunderTotalYear(s)
Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law Secretariat (joint funding from Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark and the Netherlands)$1,301,7002014-2017
DenmarkDKK 925,4332021
DKK 1,454,2532019-2020
Sweden$8,143,0642020-2022
European Union€296,6002018-2021
France€900,000 with 17 other partners. Unclear how much each NGO received2020-2023
€27,8422015
Irish Aid€81,0002021
€81,0002020
€80,6252019
€80,0002018
€80,0002017
€80,0002016
Christian Aid Ireland€70,0002017-2018
Italy€1,800,0002018-2020
NorwayNOK 5.8 million2019-2021
Open Society Foundation$800,0002020-2023
$8,9102019
$700,0002017-2019
$191,6302017-2019
GermanyN/A2017-2021
UN OCHA$178,938 with Al Mezan and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights2021-2022

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