Newsletter - January 2022
Detention figures – According to data issued quarterly by the Israeli Prison Service (IPS), as of 31 December 2021, there were 4,271 Palestinians (West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza) held as “security prisoners” in detention facilities including 145 children (12-17 years). In the case of children there was a 6% decrease in the number compared with the previous month and an annual decrease of 8% compared with 2020. Five children were held in administrative detention. According to the IPS, 64% of child detainees were transferred to prisons inside Israel in violation of the Fourth Geneva Conventionand the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. More statistics
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Forcible transfer of children - According to
data released by the Israeli Prison Service, 64 percent of Palestinian children detained by Israeli military forces in the West Bank were transferred and detained inside Israel in 2021. The transfer and detention of these children outside the West Bank is classified as a war crime under the Fourth Geneva Convention – a treaty drafted in the aftermath of the Second World War and ratified by 196 States, including Israel in 1951. The practice is also prohibited under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Experience gained during the Second World War convinced a generation of leaders that the transfer of population groups must be prohibited in all circumstances.
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A child's testimony - On 31 July 2021, a 17-year-old minor from Tubas was arrested by Israeli soldiers at a military checkpoint at 4:00 p.m. He reports being denied his legal rights and being held in solitary confinement for 7 days in Ofer prison. "I was at Tayaseer military checkpoint when I was approached by an Israeli military jeep. It was around 4:00 p.m. About six soldiers got out of the jeep and grabbed me. They swore at me and started to kick me. Then one of the soldiers tied my hands to the front with two plastic ties: one around my wrists and another higher up near my elbows. The ties were very tight and painful. Then I was blindfolded."
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