4.
Torture In Palestinian Prisons
Torture inside
Palestinian prisons is regularly practiced on a wide scale by the
Palestinian Security Services, in contradiction to the international
agreements and conventions related to the treatment of prisoners. As a
result of torture in Palestinian prisons, 20 persons have died. The
first victim fell on 4 July 1994, less than two months after the coming
of the PA, and the last was on 9 August 1998.
Torture has its
deep effects on society by manifesting in the person who was tortured,
or in and among his family and friends. There are negative and
devastating results that harm the society as a whole. For example, when
a child, hears about her brother or father tortured by the Palestinian
police, or sees the results of torture on his body, this leaves deep
psychological scars.
A) Patterns of Torture
The Palestinian
security services adopt two patterns in torturing Palestinian detainees:
-physical torture
(like direct beatings or forcing them to
sit in unusual difficult positions {known as Shabeh} or showering
them with cold and hot water; and
-psychological torture
(such as isolating them from other
prisoners for long periods of time, producing loud mysterious noises
from the next room, and sleep deprivation.
1) Physical Torture
They started
beating me very severely with their fists and kicking me with their
boots, then they used sticks to beat me on the soles of my feet
(bastinado). I felt that they wanted to break my bones.
M.D., a
Palestinian citizen who was imprisoned by the PA, told the PHRMG
They usually beat
the detainee on sensitive parts of the body, using different tools, such
as sticks or clubs, electric wires, the back of a gun, or simply their
fists and feet.
Torture was very
severe, especially during interrogation. They beat me up, and forced
me to stand on one leg carrying a big chair. They also tied my hands
to a chair behind me, and left me like that for a long time.
G.T., a
Palestinian citizen who was imprisoned by the PA, told the PHRMG
Shabeh
is a well known torture style in the Palestinian prisons. The detainee
is forced to stand or sit in unusual difficult positions with his eyes
and/or head covered. This is not only painful but may lead to complete
failure in the function of one or more of the organs of his body.
My brother was
beaten up very harshly. They also made him sit for 12 hours with his
hands tied and his eyes blindfolded on a chair that was turned upside
down.
M.M.G., the
sister of a Palestinian, who was imprisoned and tortured by the PA,
explaining to PHRMG that he confessed to a crime that he never
committed.
Push-Up style
is another physical torture pattern. It means forcing the detainee to
lie down facing the ground then pressing up and down balancing only on
his fingers and toes, sometimes more than a hundred times, until his
strength vanishes. Then the interrogators force him to do more by
beating and kicking him.
Showers of cold
and hot water is another method
of torture used in Palestinian prisons. Many prisoners testified that
they were showered with cold water after being forced to stand naked,
after midnight in the cold nights of winter.
After taking me to
Hebron Prison, I was forced to take off all my clothes including my
underwear. Then I was put in a very small dark cell (2x1m), and I was
told to sleep there, without any mattress or blanket, and during the
night they would wake me up by splashing very cold water onto me.
Z.M., a
Palestinian citizen who is an ex-prisoner of the PA, told the PHRMG
2) Psychological Torture:
-Long
periods of interrogation: PA interrogation of Palestinian detainees
often lasts for successive hours and hours, especially at night without
allowing the detainee to take a break.
They
interrogated me for hours, sometimes for 10 hours, during the night
until the morning, asking and repeating the same question time after
time. My hands were tied behind my back, and I stayed like that for
more than 10 days.
J.T., a Palestinian citizen
who was imprisoned and interrogated in Ramallah by the PA, told the
PHRMG
-Solitary Confinement is another means of psychological torture used by
the PA against Palestinian prisoners. The detainee is kept isolated away
from others in a small dark cell. Normally, prisoners remain in such
unhealthy, miserable conditions for several days. J.T., a Palestinian
who was imprisoned by the PA, told the PHRMG that they kept him in
solitary confinement for 70 days.
-Producing very loud and alarming noises from a neighhoring room,
sometimes with the help of loud-speakers, that disturb the prisoners and
deprive them of sleep.
During the interrogation with me, they accused me of collaborating
with Israel, just like that! Although everyone who knows me, knows my
clean, decent record. By doing that, they try to humiliate the
detainee.
S.N., a Palestinian
prisoner who was detained by the PA, told the PHRMG
-Terrorizing the prisoners by indicating to them that they will be
presented to the State Security Court. S.N., a Palestinian prisoner who
was detained by the PA, told the PHRMG that the interrogators told him
that he would be transferred to the State Security Court. The following
day they took him into a room filled with military officers and told him
he was in the State Security Court and that his imprisonment would be
prolonged 15 days further. But after that he discovered that the whole
matter was fabricated.
-Depriving the detainee of his family’s visits for long periods of time.
They
prevented me and my children from visiting my husband (their father)
who wasn’t brought before court yet. We didn’t know anything about
him. We didn’t even know if he was still alive, and the children were
always asking for their father.
Palestinan citizen, Z.H.,
who is a wife of a prisoner, told the PHRMG
B) Damages resulting from
Torture
1) The
physical torture of the detainee often results in serious injury and
physical evidence of the brutality used in torturing him in order to
gain confessions.
My
husband became very almost handicapped, walking on a walker, suffering
from three fractures in both his right and left thighs. He also had
four fractures in his right hand. He couldn’t work or do anything. We
had to help him in almost every thing he wanted. He always felt
miserable.
Wife of H.S.L., a
Palestinian tortured by the PA, told the PHRMG
Testimonies taken from Palestinians who were imprisoned by the PA or
from their relatives, show that in nearly every case there was physical
torture. Moreover, interrogators would intentionally beat the prisoner
on a specific part of his body, if he told them that he was sick, or had
a weak part.
2)
Negative psychological effects: In order to have a clear picture of the
passive effects of torture on the detainees, we consulted Dr. Mahmoud
Suhweil, a well-known psychiatrist who said that torture leaves very
severe negative psychological effects on the prisoner who was tortured.
These can be summarized in the following:
a.
Feeling sad,
exhausted and helpless.
b.
Weakness in
understanding or realising things happening around him.
c.
Having a headache,
loosing appetite, and feeling pains in different parts of the body.
d.
Imagining torture
that happened to him time after time.
e.
Feeling and
behaving as if the shock (torture) is happening again.
f.
Worry and fear
that cause restlessness, not getting any sleep.
g.Taking
great efforts so as to avoid thoughts and emotions related to the
torture and trying very hard to avoid any matters that remind him (the
detainee) of that torture. This attempt to forget what has happened is
often very difficult, especially if the detainee is re-arrested by the
PA, which often happens.
3)
Psychological and social effects of torture on the family and relatives
of the detainee: Negative effects of torture extend to include members
of his family, and his friends. A child who sees security officers enter
his or her house at night to take away the father or older brother…or a
girl who enters her father’s cell in prison and sees his miserable
condition…or a boy who hears his father crying during torture… All these
are examples of cases that leave very bad psychological effects on
members of the family. Such exposure can lead to poor academic
achievement in children. Detention of a person may cause dismissal from
work, thus killing the source of income for the family, thereby
seriously affecting the family economically and socially. In addition, a
detainee may feel ashamed and isolated after being released, if people
know, and they normally do, that he was tortured by the PA.
C) Examples of Torture
Case # 1
A young man from Balata
camp was severely tortured
J.A.B.,
26, told the PHRMG how he was arrested and severely tortured in Jericho
by military intelligence for 50 hours that seemed to him like 50 years.
“In
June 1999, the PA carried out an arrest campaign following the
disturbances that took place in the Balata camp between some members of
different security services, one of my friends was among those arrested,
so I went to see him in Jericho Prison, and went again on 24 September
1999 with some other friends. The second time they stopped us, as we
were going out after midnight. They left all my friends, and only kept
me. They led me into a room blindfolded (they were 4-6 persons) and
started interrogating me, accusing me of collaborating with Israel, and
being morally disreputable.
“Then
they started beating me on all parts of my body. After that, they tied
my hand and legs and beat me on my feet (bastinado) and threw me on the
wet floor, which was very painful indeed. Then, they brought me some
food to eat, but I refused to have anything and asked them to release
me. Then they beat me once more, very severely using Shabeh and
bastinado again and again. I lost conscious twice. They wouldn’t even
let me have any sleep. Then on 26 September 1999 they released me, so I
immediately went to see the military Attorney General, Mohammed al-Bishtawi.
He asked me to take off my clothes, but when he saw the effects of the
beatings he said that there was nothing strange about them. So he
transferred me to the prison clinic. Then I was taken to Ramallah, where
I spent 36 hours in the house of a senior military officer, so that my
treatment would be completed.”
Case # 2
A man from Jabalya Camp
who earns a living for 13 people is tortured severely by the PA … The
family is left without a source of income
Ayman
al-Amssy, 32, from Jabalya Camp, is a father of three children, and has
9 brothers living in the same house. He worked in al-Tira, a town inside
the Green Line. On 14 March 1999, he was arrested by the Palestinian
criminal police in Gaza on suspicion of a crime committed on 6 February
1999 in al-Tira (inside Israel). A woman from there claimed that he had
broken into her house trying to attack her and rob her house. The
Israeli police in Kfar-Saba investigated the matter and arrested Ayman
then, but after taking samples of his blood and fingerprints, the Court
in Kfar-Saba found him innocent and released him. After that incident,
Ayman continued his normal life. He returned to Gaza on 26 February 1999
and was arrested by the Palestinian criminal police, headed by Talal
Abu-Zeid, from his house on 14 March 1999 at approximately 6:30pm, on
the same crime. They told him that the Arab woman from inside Israel
approached the Palestinian Authority for justice, because the judgement
of the Israeli court did not satisfy her.
After
60 days of detention, on 9 May 1999, Ayman al-Amssy was admitted to the
intensive care unit of the al-Shifa Hospital under heavy police guard,
unconscious from the very severe torture that he suffered.
His
health state was very bad. He had marks of torture showing all over
his body. He couldn’t move his arms, and his legs had dark blue spots
on them, all from torture and beatings. He would also feel very
nervous when seeing a security man, and he would hardly sleep.
Ayman’s brother told the
PHRMG
On 30
May 1999 Ayman was released without any legal procedures. His family was
told, very simply, to come and take him. His health condition was very
bad, and he was unbalanced psychologically. He said that 6 persons beat
him savagely with no mercy whatsoever.
This
man still suffers from nightmares, all because of a mistaken arrest made
on a false basis, that destroyed the life of an innocent man, and his
family.
Case # 3
A Palestinian from East
Jerusalem, Kidnapped and Tortured by the PA
Z.M.S.,
50, is a Palestinian citizen from East Jerusalem, who was an educational
advisor in Bethlehem District since 1990. Before that, since 1979, he
had been a teacher in Hebron District, but he was dismissed from his
work by the Palestinian Preventive Security Service with no explanation
given. He told the PHRMG the following:
“On 14
April 1999 I was on my way from Jerusalem to Beer-Sheba’ via Hebron in
my own car. As I came near Dura, a military vehicle with “Preventive
Security” written on it stopped me. They were six men. Two of them took
me out to their vehicle. One of them drove my car after taking my keys
and my mobile telephone. They took me to their military office where
they searched my personal belongings. They found a photo of me with king
Hussein of Jordan when I was 14 years old, so they accused me of
collaborating with Jordan. Then they found a painting in my car, which I
did for the ex-prime minister of Israel, Ishaq Rabin, with the peace
song written in three languages (English, Arabic and Hebrew). So they
accused me of collaborating with Israel and said that “this Rabin that
you like is the war criminal who broke the bones of the Palestinians.”
Then they found a photo of my sister and her daughters at a school
picnic, so they accused me of tumbling girls sexually.
“After
that, the same six men from the Preventive Security Service took me to
an old cave on the outskirts of Dura, where they threw me on the ground
full of thorns, beat me savagely all over my body, and demanded that I
confess of the charge of collaborating with both Jordan and Israel. But
I refused. So they took me to Hebron Prison, where they left me in a
small cell, almost unconscious. They told me that I would have to sleep
there, naked, as my clothes were torn and there was no blanket or
anything. In the middle of the night they would come and throw very cold
water onto me, and beat me up again and again. They interrogated me once
more and demanded that I confess to the charges, but I refused and
denied having any connections with Israel or Jordan, despite the severe
torture. They asked why I wasn’t married. I told them that I don’t like
women, nor my do brothers. None of us was married. So they accused me of
having sex with Israeli girls regularly, but I denied that. So they took
me back to the cell for another round of severe beating and Shabeh.
“This
state of conditions continued until the 19 April 1999 when they entered
my cell and told me that I could go home. I asked for my car, so they
gave it to me, and I was shocked to see that its front glass was
completely smashed, and the interior was damaged. I felt pain in every
part of my body, so I went to see a doctor, to discover that I had
fractures in my chest, and one in my head.”
Case # 4
“Space for an Opinion” about
the Arrest of the Journalist Maher
al-Dasouqi
Maher al-Dasouqi,
who represents a TV programme called “Space for an Opinion” was arrested
by the Palestinian Preventive Security Service on 15 September 1999 for
15 days. After his release, he was interviewed on that programme as a
guest to speak about that experience, and he said:
“It was an
unavoidable visit”
“On 15 September
1999 at around 11:30 am, an armed group of men from the Preventive
Security Service and some civilians entered my private office and said
that the Military General Prosecutor ordered my arrest for 15 days on
the charge of incitement and possessing incitement material, although
they didn’t search my office for that “incitement material.”
“That period of 15
days was very difficult for me and my family, and it was illegal because
the arrest order was issued by the Military Prosecutor, and I am a
civilian citizen not a military man!
“During the
interrogation they tortured me. They made me sit in unusual positions
(Shabeh), blindfolded my eyes, tied my hands and legs, and beat me
very severely on various parts of my body. And when I explained that I
had problems with my stomach they beat me in that area. I also informed
them that I suffer from infections in my eyes, but they folded my eyes
with a dirty piece of cloth that caused serious infections in them, and
so I was taken to a doctor.
“I went on a hunger
strike for the way they treated me, and when my lawyer, advocate Husni
Kalbouneh, visited me, I told him all about the torture and beating.
“It is shocking how
they interrogate and torture people. The most surprising thing is that
the torture and beating are carried out by fellow Palestinians against
their own colleagues who were probably imprisoned together by Israel
some time in the past! They also humiliate the detainee, mistreat him
and call him the ugliest names. They even accused me of being a
collaborator, and practiced great psychological pressure on me which
left devastating effects on me and my family (my child suffers
now from a psychological problem, and my wife was put on her own in a
room when she came to visit me, although she is pregnant in her sixth
month). It is really astonishing how those individuals were transformed
from freedom fighters to torture executioners.
“The techniques and
methods they use in their interrogation and the beatings, the
humiliation they practice, and the accusations they utter against
detainees create an unbalanced personality within the individuals which
is very difficult to overcome.
“My release was
unconditional. There were some parties from outside that applied
pressure for my release, although extending my detention was likely to
happen, nonetheless.”
D) Death in Custody
1) The Death of Mohammed Ahmad
Shreiteh, 34,
On 4 October 1999
There are different
stories regarding the death of Mohammed Ahmad Shreiteh, 34. He
was beaten by the police in Hebron, following non-payment of a debt of
300 shekels to a person from Idna village. Previously, while
Mohammed was in the Nuba area, where he had a dispute with the
owner of his rented house, he went to the police to complain but was
shocked when he was placed in prison without a warrant or a detention
order. This was on 28 September 1999.
On that same day, one of his brothers went
to the police and asked Lieutenant Jameel Abed, who is in charge
of the Police in Nuba, to release Mohammed on bail because he
suffers from bad health (problems with his heart). But the police
officer refused this request, and replied by saying that he holds
responsibility if anything happens to Mohammed.
On the second night
after his arrest, Mohammed suffered a heart attack, so they called the
military doctor, Hisham al-Haroub, who checked him and said that
he needed urgent medical treatment which wasn’t available with the
military medical services. However, the police officer ignored that and
transferred Mohammed to the police headquarters in Hebron.
Many members of his
family came to see him at the police station in Hebron and demanded his
release because of his very bad health situation.
At last, they released him, and his family
took him to Alia hospital in Hebron where they put him
immediately in the intensive care unit, but he died the same night at
7:00 pm. The doctor’s report said that the reason for his death was
purely due to heart failure, but members of the family are convinced
that what caused his death was the beating he took from the Palestinian
Police, and nothing else.
2) The Death of Mahmoud
al-Bajjali, 33,
On 6 December 1999
Mahmoud
was arrested by the Israeli authorities on 6 November 1994, and charged
with a criminal offense. His cousins accused him of having sex with, and
then killing Fatima Mahmoud Abdul-Saber, from the family, who was found
killed near the Dead Sea. It was later discovered that she was pregnant.
Mahmoud
spent one year in Israel in Juneid Detention Centre, then was
transferred to the PA prison in Nablus where he spent two years before
he was taken to Ramallah Central Prison where he died on 6 December
1999. His mother went to see him on that day at 1:00 (after he died),
but the police only allowed her to see his face. Then the general
prosecutor of Ramallah ordered that his body be taken to Abu-Dis for
autopsy at al-Quds University.
So
Mahmoud spent 5 years in prison (one in Israel and four in the PA)
without any trial or a real charge. His early days in prison were not
“very bad”; he didn’t suffer from any illness or complain much.
The family of the killed
woman, Fatima, agreed for a tribal conciliation, and received eight
thousand Jordanian Dinars as ransom, but they refused to drop the case,
therefore he remained in prison.
