Administrative detention of Palestinian minors ongoing - report

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Palestinian Center for Prisoners' Studies
26 Apr 2023 18:55
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The Palestinian Centre for Prisoners' Studies reveals that more than 1,030 prisoners are administrative detainees in occupation prisons, including women and children.

Israeli occupation forces detain a Palestinian boy during clashes in the West Bank city of Al-Khalil, Oct. 13, 2017 (Reuters)

The Palestinian Center for Prisoners' Studies confirmed that "the [Israeli] occupation authorities have escalated, during the last year, from its policy of administrative detention of Palestinians, affecting all groups, including minors, where eight minors are currently under administrative detention."

The center stated, on Wednesday, that the "Ofer" Military Court issued a 6-month administrative detention decision against secondary student Yehya Mohammed Al-Rimawi, who is 17 years old, from Beit Rima, a neighborhood located west of Ramallah. Al-Rimawi was arrested by the Israeli occupation forces on April 17 after raiding his family home."

Moreover, a week ago, the occupation courts announced that 17-year-old Kassim Mohammed Houmada, the boy from Al-Khalil who had been detained in Israeli prison, was transferred to administrative detention for 6 months. Similarly, the captive 17-year-old Jamal Muhammad Adi, from the town of Beit Umm, north of Al-Khalil, was also sentenced to administrative detention for another 4 months.

The Director of the Research Center, Riad Al-Ashqar, said that "since the beginning of the year, the occupation courts have issued numerous administrative decisions against minors, some of which are new orders while others have been renewed for additional periods ranging from 3 to 6 months."

Al-Ashqar stated emphasized that "some minors who have passed childhood while behind bars," and accused the Israeli occupation of abusing the administrative detention procedure, "taking advantage of the permissible legal leave in exceptional circumstances and expanding its application, without adhering to the established judicial principles and procedures, as well as to the guarantees established by international law."

As such, Al-Ashqar argued that "Israel" has used administrative detention as "an instrument of collective punishment of Palestinians including women, children and the sick."

"Through the policy of administrative detention," argued Al-Ashqar, the occupation aims to force an aging population upon Palestine thus containing any resistance initiatives given that young Palestinians are likely to spend their lives behind bars "without legal basis," and through "secret files that no one is allowed to access."

Al-Ashqar revealed that as a result of the intensification of administrative detention orders against prisoners, the number of administrative prisoners in occupation prisons rose to more than 1,030, most of them who are considered liberated prisoners, known to have spent varying periods in prisons before getting arrested again.

Some of those liberated prisoners now under administrative detention are two female detainees: Rawda Abu Ajmiyah from Beit Lahm, and Raghad El-Qunah from Tulkarm, as well as 8 minors suffering from cancer.

Al-Ashqar reiterated his demand that international institutions "urgently intervene to halt this massacre of Palestinian prisoners" and "place strict restrictions on the imposition of administrative detention, in line with the provisions of humanitarian charters."

He also called on the Palestinian Authority to refer the case of unlawful administrative detention to international courts "to comply with the determinants imposed by the law when using this arbitrary policy."