PRESS RELEASE
The PHRMG expresses its maximum solidarity supporting
Palestinian Political Prisoners
On
Palestinian detainees have submitted demands particularly focused on:
- improving of medical care facilities in the Israeli prisons;
- ending prohibitions of and restrictions on family visits, particularly prevented by the presence of a glass screen between the prisoner and the visitors;
- stopping the humiliating daily strip searches;
- improving minors and women’s condition in the prisons, separating them from Israeli common law criminals;
- allowing the prisoners to have free access to public telephones;
- ending all the restrictions upon educational issues such as the prohibition to be enrolled in any Arab university or the bar to take courses in Political Science or Sociology considered as a “threat of security”;
- ending the awful solitary confinement as well as the arbitrary and indiscriminate beatings perpetrated by Israeli soldiers during the interrogations and inside the cells.
Palestinian political prisoners indeed consider the ongoing hunger strike as the last option to protest : the systematic policy of torture and inhuman harassment applied by Israeli authorities in the detention centers; the deprivation of basic rights; the tight restrictions imposed on prisoners regarding family visits, food supplies, medical treatments and recreational activities. They regularly undergo frustrating and deplorable treatments such as humiliating strip searches, while they are naked, before leaving their cells, including when they are going to meet with the doctor of the center or their lawyers. Additionally, Israeli prison guards deny any kind of physical contact between Palestinian detainees and their small children during the visit time, creating such a frustrating mood. On the contrary, all the Israeli prisoners are entirely free to meet their relatives without any type of restriction.
On this basis, the PHRMG is
extremely concerned about Palestinian prisoners’ conditions in the Israeli
detention centers and expresses its maximum solidarity to them, totally
supporting their humanitarian demands.
Since the beginning of the Israeli occupation in 1967, more than 650,000 Palestinians have been arrested by Israeli authorities. Nowadays, there are approximately 7,500 Palestinian political prisoners being held in Israeli detention centers, suffering inhuman treatments and daily ongoing humiliations. Furthermore, over 750 of them are detained under the so called “administrative detention” procedure, allowing Israeli authorities to arrest Palestinians without any charge or trial for indefinite periods of time, just claiming unspecified “security reasons”.
The PHRMG strongly criticizes the
application of such a completely unfair system, clearly in violation of the Art.
9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which states
that:
Everyone has the right to liberty and security of person. No one shall be
subjected to arbitrary arrest or detention. No one shall be deprived of his
liberty except on such grounds and in accordance with such procedure as are
established by law.
Furthermore, Israeli methods used in the detention centers represent grave violations of several international rules.
In particular,
the Art. 10 of the United Nations International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights, ratified by
“All persons deprived of their
liberty shall be treated with humanity and with respect for the inherent
dignity of the human person”.
Moreover, the Standard Minimum
Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, adopted in
“Prisoner shall be allowed to
communicate with heir family and reputable friends at regular intervals, both
by correspondence and by receiving visits; prisoners shall be kept informed
regularly of the more important items of news by the reading of newspapers or
periodicals and by hearing wireless transmission”.
The Fourth Geneva Convention,
adopted in 1949, explicitly considers as illegal the confinement of Palestinian
political prisoners in the detention centers outside the
“Protected persons accused of
offences shall be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted, they
shell serve their sentences therein”.
As a form of psychological torture, barbecues have been set up by Israeli guards near the cells of Palestinian security prisoners in an effort to undermine their aim of keeping striking. Prisons Service guards have also confiscated cigarettes and candy and removed pens and newspapers. In addition, all family visits have been entirely denied with the aim of combating the ongoing strike.
The PHRMG calls upon the Israeli Government to stop the wide-spread violations perpetrated in the detention centers, respecting the Palestinian prisoners’ rights of strike as well as starting recognizing their basic rights in accordance with the International Law.
The PHRMG also strongly condemns the
shocking statement issued by Israeli Minister of Interior Security, Tsahi Hanegbi, in relation to the
Palestinian prisoner’s strike. The refusal to hospitalize detainees whose
medical status has deteriorated because of the ongoing hunger strike, on the
basis that they are all terrorists, is completely deplorable, inhuman and
inexcusable. Such a behavior disqualifies
On this regard the PHRMG calls on the medical personnel in the Israeli detention centers to supply any medical care and assistance to the Palestinian prisoners in need and calls upon the Israeli Minister of Interior Security to retract his unacceptable declarations, respecting the prisoners’ right of expression.
Moreover, the PHRMG calls upon
the members of the International Community to immediately take any possible action
preventing
Finally, supporting the voice of detainees, their families and the whole Palestinian civil society, the PHRMG urgently demands to the Israeli authorities:
1) The end of any form of collective punishment perpetrated by Israeli personnel against Palestinian political prisoners;
2) The improvement of medical care facilities in the detention centers;
3) The installation of public telephones in the prisons;
4) The removal of the glass partitions separating prisoners from visitors;
5) The end of all the humiliating and frustrating daily strip searches perpetrated against Palestinian political prisoners.
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