New Caabu report highlights extensive abuse of Palestinian detainees

Posted by on 11 Oct 2012

With roughly three-quarters of a million Palestinians imprisoned since Israel’s occupation began, there are few Palestinian families who have not had a member in an Israeli jail.

Caabu’s latest report, Palestinian detainees: no security in injustice, provides an in-depth examination of the issue of prisoners in both Israeli and Palestinian jails.

The report emphasises the seriousness of the prisoner issue, and how the widespread use of detention without trial, rampant ill-treatment and ethnically-segregated systems of law entrench mistrust, increase tensions and ultimately exacerbate the conflict. 
 
Caabu’s Director, Chris Doyle, said of the report:
“How can it be right that a Jewish settler child must see a civilian judge within 12 hours, when a Palestinian child can wait four days to be seen by a military judge? The settler child must see a lawyer within two days, a Palestinian can wait 90. These are just two examples of the embedded and deliberate discrimination of Israel’s justice system which must be challenged if we are to foster any semblance of peace in the region.”

Caabu has demanded action on this important issue by calling on the government to:

• Pressure Israel to end all discriminatory practices;
• Demand that administrative detention only be used as a matter of last resort and for limited periods;
• Act on the recommendations of the June 2012 Foreign Office-backed report on child detainees, including full implementation of international and humanitarian law;
• Demand that prisoners and detainees be afforded their full rights under international law; and
• Ensure that no British company is party to violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention, such as G4S’ reported transfer of Palestinian prisoners across the border into Israel.

Find the full report here.

For further comment contact: Chris Doyle

07968040281 . doylec@caabu.org

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Report: Israel rounded up 1,200 minors since start of 2010

[ 31/05/2011 - 09:28 PM ] 
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- A report released Tuesday reveals a drastic escalation in friction between Israeli police and the Palestinian citizens of Jerusalem, especially those in the Silwan and Al-Issawiyya districts.
Issued by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, the report documents that police since the beginning of 2010 rounded up 1,200 Palestinian suspected of throwing stones and kept some 760 of them in custody. About a third of those arrested were indicted and imprisoned until the end of the legal proceedings, the ACRI said.
“The large numerical gap between the youth who were questioned and arrested and those who were actually indicted speaks to the suspicions of Palestinians, who believe that most of these arrests and interrogations are intended solely to intimidate the minors,” the report says.
It details that in the past few months, wide-ranging clashes have erupted between Israeli police and Jerusalemites, where the police used excessive force killing one child in Al-Issawiyya after he breathed toxic gas that police hurled into residential areas.
The report also highlights the police's use of collective punishment, violence, and pressure against the Palestinian population when enforcing Israeli laws in Jerusalem. It adds that complaints that civilians file against Israeli occupation authorities have often gone ignored.
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Geneva conference: 2011 a year for Palestinian women in Israeli jails, Women stage anti-political detention protests at Al-Khalil government office

[ 13/03/2011 - 12:50 PM ]

GENEVA, (PIC)-- 2011 was declared as the year of Palestinian female prisoners during the first international conference on the rights of Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails which concluded its sessions in Geneva on Saturday evening.

The conferees discussed in details on Friday and Saturday at the UN headquarters and the conference palace in Geneva the incarceration condition of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails as well as in other countries' prisons.

The effective participation of Swiss, French, British and Greek political activists in the conference clearly reflected that the suffering of Palestinian prisoners is no longer an internal Palestinian affair and that the policy of deception and disinformation used by Israel does not work anymore with the international community.

The European network to support the rights of the Palestinian prisoners, one of the main organizers of the conference, stated that it would make 2011 a year for the support of Palestinian women imprisoned in Israeli jails.

Indonesian lawmaker Nour Hayati, for her part, said her country would host next year an international conference on the support of Palestinian women.

Swiss, French and British politicians called in their speeches for increasing international pressure on Israel in order to isolate it and for prosecuting its officials in international courts.

The European network also revealed that it formed a group of media and legal committees to activate the issue of Palestinian prisoners and file complaints on their behalf with international tribunals, and declared its intention to establish a number of projects for the support of prisoners and their families.

Women stage anti-political detention protests at Al-Khalil government office

[ 13/03/2011 - 06:13 PM ]

AL-KHALIL, (PIC)-- Women's lobby groups staged a sit-in Sunday at Al-Khalil government headquarters to protest political discrimination by the West Bank-ruling Palestinian Authority.

The protests included Palestinian Legislative Council member Samira al-Halayka. Her husband, who had been held by PA preventative security, was set free ensuing the events.

The women shouted slogans denouncing the Palestinian national split, which they said was caused by the continued political arrests and dismissal of government positions targeting Hamas supporters in the West Bank.

The governor of Al-Khalil denied political arrests and job dismissals after verbal quarrels broke out with prisoner relatives.

The protesters however said they got their point across and revealed the violations made by the PA security agencies.

Later that day, Mohammed Zaytoun al-Halayka, husband to MP Samira al-Halayka, was set free after serving 65 days tied up, tortured and isolated.

MP Halayka had explained during the sit-in how her husband was tortured while in detention to the media.

Halayka had also participated the same day at noon in a women's gathering including the ”women against the split” group in Halhul town north of Al-Khalil. She gave an in-detail talk about political detention and suppression of freedoms, and gave statistics on political arrests, job dismissals and the violations of the PA security agencies in the West Bank.

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Egypt: The people are determinant. The people have spoken.

Aadel M Al-Mahdy
Feb. 1.2011 7:38 am/pacific


It is now Tuseday, Feb. 1. 2011 4:38 in Egypt. I have been trying over the last few hours to call my sister on both her house phone and cell-phone, but all my efforts doomed to failur. A few minuets ago, I tried her cell phone again and had a long conversation with her.

1. Demonstrators in Cairo, Liberation Square (Midaan Al-Tahrir) are  more than one million (closer to 2 millions).
2. All demonstrators demand Mubarak and his new cabinet to resign.
3. Demonstration are taking place all over Egypt and in tens of thousands.  Upper Egypt: Cairo (approx. 2,000,000), Alexandria (approx 1,000,000, Suez (approx 250,000), Menofiyyah (Mubaraks' birth place/approx. 150,000)), and Lower Egypt: Meniya, Luxor, Qina and Aswan (but in very few numbers). 
4. The cities that did not see demonstration yet are those ones on the red sea: Hurghada (Gardaka), Marsa-Alam.
5. Military forces are everywhere to protect people and country, and confirming that the people have legitimate rights to demonstrate. 
6. Next Friday is going to be even a greater day. 
7. Presidential palace has not yet been besieged.

Also it is worth mentioning that there are few voices on Al-Manaar TV station, and another one or two stations criticizing ElBaradei and alleging that he is an American boy. My own personal opinion is that those people, though my sister mentioned that some of them were university professor, work for the old rotten regime.

I asked my sister if this thing about ElBaradei a common attitude amongst the demonstrators. She said NO, and added that it is only aired on the TV stations mentioned above. 

In addition, she is also having difficulties watching Al-Jazira, as  the station keeps jumping from one channel to the other since frequency of transmission keeps changing all the time.

 
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