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Home » Children »

Testimony - H.K.

 

 Name:  H.K.
 Age:  13 
 Date of incident:  6 August 2013
 Location:  Deir Nidham
 Accusation:  Throwing stones

On 6 August 2013, a 13-year-old minor from Deir Nidham was arrested by Israeli soldiers at 3:00 p.m. and accused of throwing stones. He reports ill-treatment and being denied his basic legal rights under Israeli military law. He reports being held for 10 hours before being released without charge. 

I was in my village when I saw Israeli soldiers in the street. It was around 3:00 p.m. I ran to my friend’s house and took my T-Shirt off because I was scared they had seen me and would identify me from my shirt. There were no clashes going on at the time.
 
Then the soldiers came to my friend’s house and saw the T-Shirt in the room. My friend told them it was mine. They told my friend’s mother that they were going to take both of us for a short while and would return us soon. They didn’t tell us why.
 
We were put us in a jeep and it drove away. The jeep stopped a short time later and they made us sit on the side of the road for one-and-a-half hours and didn’t allow us to speak. Then they took us to a valley and made us kneel on some thorns. They told us if we didn’t keep our heads down they were going to shoot us. My friend kept his head down but when I moved my head I heard the soldiers prepare their guns as if they were going to shoot. I was terrified.
 
At one point the soldiers brought some food but we refused to eat because we were fasting as it was Ramadan. They were yelling at us and tried to force us to eat. I asked one of the soldiers when they were going to release us and he told me not until we confessed to throwing stones.
 
Later two female soldiers drove us to the settlement of Bet El where we were made to wait in a shipping container. It was very cold in the container and I asked for a jacket. A soldier gave me a jacket. He offered me some biscuits but I refused. Other soldiers were making fun of us. One of them said we were good-looking and asked if we wanted to get married. They accused us of throwing a stone that hit a settler car. I told the commander this wasn’t true. No one told us anything about our rights. 
 
Later the commander phoned the District Coordination Office. We were then taken somewhere else and I saw policemen sitting there. I didn’t know whether they were Israeli or Palestinian policemen until I saw the Palestinian flag. The Palestinian policemen took us home. I arrived home at around 2:00 a.m., over 10 hours after my arrest.
 
A week later I saw the same soldiers in our village and I was terrified. I ran away and hid at my uncle’s house.