RAMALLAH: The Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) slammed the Israeli forces for failing to address reports of soldiers abusing Palestinian prisoners, neglecting to formulate clear arrest-transport orders that would ensure prisoners’ safety.
PCATI said in its semi-annual report released yesterday that Israeli soldiers routinely abuse Palestinian prisoners while being taken into custody and the army and law enforcement ignores the abuse.
The report, dubbed “Unlawful in reality — soldiers’ abuse of Palestinian detainees,” unveils a series of cases in which Palestinians who were arrested and handcuffed were abused by Israeli soldiers while being detained or transported to a holding facility, to the extent that some of them needed medical attention.
The PCATI report noted 90 testimonies of abuse between 2006 and 2007, but said the actual number of cases is higher. The Israeli forces, said the report, is doing little to nothing to stop this abuse.
PCATI’s report said the Israeli military chooses to ignore the majority of these cases. “The fact is that soldiers abuse handcuffed detainees has become somewhat of a routine matter,” said the report. “The military and its wardens are doing nothing to stop this phenomenon.” The report goes on to say that between 2000 and 2007, the Israeli Military Police launched 427 investigations into abuse allegations. According to an Israeli force’s spokesperson’s unit report, filed with the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din, only 35 of the investigations resulted in indictments. According to the PCATI, even the cases that made it to trial resulted in convictions of soldiers on charges that carry no more than a four-month prison term.
