Israel arbitrarily closed Palestinian children in record number. This must stop

Palestinian boys – mostly 15 to 17, but sometimes 12 -year -old – have been targeted for a long time by Israeli Military for arrest, detention and criminal prosecution.

Israel is the only country in the world that automatically and systematically pursues children in military courts with between 500 and 700 Palestinian BOYS detained and prosecuted criminally annual.

A Increasing number Of those children, they have not been accused of any crime and are detained in accordance with the orders of administrative detention. They are part of the largest cohort of Palestinian administrative prisoners in history.

Since the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, the Israeli forces have seriously escalated the Palestinian arrest efforts, including children.

The most consistent source of prisoners is the penitentiary service in Israel, which issues the number of heads once per quarter, including age and tax breakdown – or their lack. Groups for human rights such as the one I work for, the defense for international children – Palestine (DIP), monitors these numbers, documents the conditions of imprisonment and testifies from prisoners.

Only with the numbers are alarming: for the last year, every time the penitentiary service in Israel has issued the number of the head, the number of prisoners of Palestinian children held in administrative detention was the highest.

The most recent number of heads – 112 administrative prisoners of Palestinian children from the end of December – is Almost five times Number of children held without accusation before October 7, 2023. Administrative prisoners now represents More than one in three Palestinian prisoners.

Quick expansion

Israeli forces rapidly extended the use of administrative restraint to exercise control over Palestinian children and families in occupied Cisiorordania.

Israeli authorities have adopted harsh restrictions on access to Israeli prisons after October 7th. Family visits were suspended In whole, and the visits of lawyers representing the prisoners became extremely difficult, frequently rejected by the Israeli authorities.

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As a result, DICP lawyers collected first of all testimony from children after their release from Israeli custody. They all reported that the conditions of imprisonment have been significantly damaged, with Israeli prison regularly serving rotten foods, denying access to toilets and showers and crowded cells with twice the appropriate number of children.

“The food is of poor quality, unclean and insufficient for us as children. It causes me difficulty because I suffer from stomach problems ”, Jamal, 16 years old (who spoke under a pseudonym for safety reasons) SAPS DCIP, which describes the situation in the I offer. “There is little comfort in the cell, because there are not enough beds for everyone. Some of us have to sleep on the floor in shifts. “

Until every Palestinian child is released from Israeli custody … We must continue to fight to reunite children with their families

The Israeli forces detained Jamal from his house in the ARROUB refugee camp in southern the busy West in summer, after they had previously shot him with live ammunition. On the date he was detained, he was scheduled to have a surgery to repair the injury.

“The soldiers exploited my injury, forcing me to stay and kneel on the injured knee for five hours. I was seriously beaten if I moved because of the pain, “Jamal told DIP, adding that the pressure made his wound reopen.

“They put headphones on my ears and sang songs at a strong and annoying volume for an hour and a half, knowing that I suffer from hearing in the right ear, and this caused me pain in my ear and left head,” Jamal added.

Notorious cruelty

Israeli interrogators are notorious because they have performed acts of physical and psychological cruelty against Palestinian children to extract a confession.

While international legal standards emphasize that children accused of a crime have the right to have a family member and a lawyer with them during the interrogation, Palestinian children are granted.

Jamal never presented accusations; Instead, Israeli forces held it in accordance with a administrative detention command. This meant that neither he nor his family had any idea when he was released, why he was accused or when he could go home.

Now as hundreds of Palestinian prisoners are finally being released As part of the armistice agreement between Israel and Hamas, some prisoners go home to their families.

The Israeli authorities threaten their families in the effort to stop talking to the media -another effort to isolate their children and their families.

The widespread and extended use of the Israeli army of administrative detention to target Palestinian children amount to an arbitrary detention and has no position in international law.

Until every Palestinian child is released from Israeli custody and this practice of children are abolished, we must continue to fight to bring children with their families.

The opinions expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of the Middle East.