Testimony: M.M.M.D.
Name: | M.M.M.D. |
Age: | 14 |
Date: | 15 May 2019 |
Location: | Kafr Ni'meh, West Bank |
Accusation: | Throwing stones |
On 15 May 2019, a 14-year-old minor from Kafr Ni’meh was arrested by Israeli soldiers from home at 5:00 a.m. and accused of throwing stones. He reports being informed of his basic legal rights under Israeli military law. He reports being released the same day without charge.
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On 15 May 2019, my mother woke me up at around 5:00 a.m. and told me soldiers were outside our house. Shortly afterwards we heard loud banging at our front door and we could hear them trying to attach a device to the door to force it open. My father quickly opened the door and about 15 soldiers entered our home. They were accompanied by a commander and an intelligence officer.
The soldiers took my parents’ identity cards and checked them and then told my father they wanted to arrest me and my brother. My father told the commander he wanted to accompany us but the commander refused. Then he gave my father two documents scribbled in Hebrew, with details about my arrest and my brother’s arrest. He asked my father to sign it but my father refused to sign.
The soldiers then took me outside where they tied my hands behind my back with one plastic tie which was tight and painful. The soldiers also blindfolded me before leading me a short distance to a military jeep. I was taken to the back of the jeep and made me sit on the metal floor. Inside the jeep soldiers swore at me and called me “a son of a whore”. They also swore at my religion.
The jeep drove to a nearby military base where I was examined by a doctor. The doctor removed the tie and the blindfold during the examination. I was left at the military base until around noon when I was taken for interrogation. I have no idea where the interrogation centre was but there they removed the blindfold and I was allowed to speak to a lawyer on speaker phone. The lawyer told me to remain silent and not to confess or be afraid. The conversation lasted for about a minute and the interrogator was listening.
The interrogator was an Israeli policeman. The first thing he said to me was that I had the right to remain silent. Then he told me he had images of me throwing stones on Route 463 which is used by settlers. I denied the accusation and challenged him to show me the image. He never showed me anything. When he repeated the accusation I told him I was going to exercise me right to remain silent but he got upset with me and raised his voice and accused me of monitoring the area where boys were throwing stones at settler cars on Route 463. Again I denied the accusation.
The interrogation lasted for about 30 minutes and then he showed me a document and asked me to sign it. I signed the document without reading it; I don’t even know what language it was in.
After the interrogation I was taken to a courtyard where I waited until my brother was interrogated. Then someone took my photograph and fingerprints. Shortly afterwards my father came and took both me and my brother home. We arrived home at around 7:00 p.m.