A documentary report on the situation of Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails (2)

About one million Palestinians have experienced detention

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The Commission of Detainees Affairs affirmed that the history of the Palestinian Captive Movement started with the beginning of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories in 1948. It also affirmed that the Israeli authorities used detention as a policy of controlling the Palestinian people and as a means of collective punishment. The number of arrest cases is estimated to one million cases throughout the years of Israeli occupation.

 

Detainees,, facts and figures

 

The most prominent violations practiced by the prisons administrations against Palestinian detainees:

 

·       Medical negligence

The policy of medical negligence has increased recently, where the number of sick detainees has risen to more than 700 cases of illness, including 95 cases of disability, paralysis and chronic diseases. Moreover, there are more than 30 detainees who suffer from cancer, and 25 detainees who have mental diseases.

Studies conducted by the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs indicate that 60 martyrs died since 1967 due to deliberate medical negligence, bringing the number of martyrs to (217)

·       Minors' detention

Israeli occupation forces did not exclude children from detention, whether be males or females, and did not respect the international agreements in dealing with them. They arrested thousands of children putting them in jails without taking into consideration their age or their weak body structure. Moreover, they practiced many types of physical and psychological torture, bad treatment and many other violations. The rate of torture and bad treatment is estimated of 90%, where Israel has legislated their detention and torture not based on security reasons as they claim, but it is a punitive measure against children to destroy their future and dreams. 300 male and female children under the age of eighteen are currently imprisoned in Israeli jails.

·       Administrative detention

Administrative detention is the most arrogant method practiced by the Israeli occupation forces as a systematic policy against Palestinians. They made it a firm policy since 1967 and resorted to it as an easy choice to justify detaining Palestinians without charges or trails under the pretext of the so-called "secret file". It is practiced as a collective punishment against thousands of Palestinians contrary to the rules of International Law. Since 2000, nearly 25.000 administrative detention sentences were issued against males and females, and currently there are 450 administrative detainees imprisoned in Israeli jails.

·       Solitary confinement

The punishment of solitary confinement has escalated through a decision by the Israeli Intelligence, where this isolation is renewed every 6 months under the pretext of security reasons and that the detainee poses a threat to Israel's security.

The number of isolated detainees reached to 15 during 2017, detained in harsh conditions where the cells are very small, narrow and full of insects. The majority of them are prohibited form family visits.

·       Depriving families of visits and imposing fines

The Israeli occupation authorities continue to deprive hundreds of detainees of family visits under feeble security reasons, including the detainee's relatives of first class such as: (mother, father, son and wife), which falls under the policy of collective punishment.

The Israeli Prison Service deliberately use the visit as a means of punishment for detainees, and also for their families due to the searches on checkpoints and preventing many of them of entering the checkpoint. They also practice the policy of imposing high fines on detainees and minors.

·       Transportation

The transportation among prisons is a real suffering for detainees. "Bosta" is a term used for the process of transferring detainees from one prison to another or to the court. This "journey" may take many days, where detainees are transferred by huge buses and kept for many hours in iron cages.

·       Female detainees

Female detainees are exposed to beating, insults, cursing and threatening during their interrogation and detention. Their suffering continues through solitary confinement, denial of family visits, deprivation of medical treatment and education. Currently, there are 64 female detainees in Hasharon and Damoon prisons, including 11 mothers, 10 minors and 7 females who have relatives in prisons.

 

·       Imposing racist laws against detainees

1.    Force-feeding law against detainees on hunger strike

2.    Raising sentences against minors who throw stones

3.    Raising the minimum penalty for stone throwers in Jerusalem.

4.    Law of prosecuting minors under the age of 14

5.    Law of body inspection without any suspicions

6.    Law of exempting the Intelligence from documenting the interrogation

7.    Law of executing detainees

8.    Bill draft to condemn Palestinians without suspicions

9.    Anti- Terrorism law

10.                    Law of the Israeli civil courts recognition of the resolutions of the military courts

11.                    Draft bill to deprive detainees of education

12.                    Law of retaining the allocations of detainees and martyrs

13.                    Law of forbidding visits for detainees who belong to Palestinian organizations that hold Israelis

14.                    Draft bill that allow retaining the bodies of martyrs