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IPC Meets Families of Children Prisoners in Israeli Jail

GAZA, Palestine, March 13,2005 (IPC)---Slamming all the international conventions and norms bonding respect to human rights, the incarceration conditions of Palestinian children inside the Israeli jails have been deteriorating at an alarming scale, to the extent that the lives of the children are threatened.

Since the outbreak of Aqsa Intifada in September 2000, about 3,000 Palestinian children have been arrested. 300 children are still prisoner in Israeli prisons and detention facilities, making up 47% of the registered prisoners.

The Palestinian Prisoner Society (PPS) reported that 9% of the children prisoners are sick. The sick detainees are denied access to medical care and at the same time the Israeli authorities do not medically serve them. More than 450 children Palestinian children arrested during 2004 as well as 99% of the jailed children are subjected to various forms of inhuman and cruel treatment-including beatings, sleep and food deprivation, position abuse (Shabeh), threatening language (including threats of death, sexual assault, and/or threats on his/her life or that of family members) and isolation-while undergoing interrogation . 100 Palestinian children were below 16 year old.

The Palestinian prisonerand ex-prisoner ministry said, in a report, about the Palestinian children inside the Israeli jails, the Israeli occupation forces still imprison 321 children from al the Palestinian provinces in prisons and detention facilities including 11 girls and 120 children prisoners FROM Nablus city of the west bank.

The international Press Center (IPC) team tries to keep in touch with the agony of the Palestinian children inside the Israeli prisons and facilities in Nablus city and met the relatives of a number of the children prisoners to expose the Israeli illegal practices, contravening the international laws and norms.

Abed Al Rhman Ortani, 14, recalled the moment of the arrest of his brother Nasser, 17, at dawn 25/3/204 from his residence in Raphedia area by saying "they (the Israeli soldiers) get us off the house in the street then asked me about my brother Nasser and when my mother informed them he had been inside the house, they arrested him and threw him inside the military jeep, severely beating him pointed their guns and fired towards his legs.

"I was very worried about my brother when they fired in the direction of his feet and asked my mother why they arrested, she did not reply me. At this moment I felt sad about the absence of my brother," Abed Al Rhman sighed.

He went onto saying "at dawn 25/8/2004, the Israeli troops visited us to arrest my mother with no reason accounted for. When they arrested her they smashed all the furniture of the house and turn it upside down even the van hanged in the ceiling was dismantled. After awhile of her arrest the lawyer informed us she will spend six month sin the jails, depriving me from mother and brother alike."

In the refugee camp of Al Ein, west of Nablus the IPC's met the relative of the child prisoner Yousef Fouad Abu Khaleifa ,17, , his mother said in anguish voice" they arrested him from the house as an admission by another prisoner accused him of planting an explosive grenade … for two years I never see him, I do not know what happen to him in Talmound jail as the prison service banned him to call the family and disallowed his family visitation under the allegedly reason of being the residents of Nablus."

Om Yousef went onto saying "they sentenced him three years and bailed him US $435. "

in Balata refugee camp , east of Nablus , the IPC's met with the mother of the child prisoner Mohammed Al Hashash, she said "they arrested my son when they hindered an ambulance evacuating him to the hospital after he was wounded with sharpen his neck and chest and his two hand that were paralyzed. "she sighed " after his arrest he was moved to Talmound prison in a serious condition ten moved to Tal Hashomeer afterwards to Hewara concentration camp where he has been undergone to an investigation despite of the health downhill."

Seething in panic, the mother said" I always cry … being made apart is not only the problem but how this child will build his future as his hands are paralyzed."

The IPC's visited the family of the child prisoner Hanan Lutfi Al Khanssa', 17, from Ein Biet Al Maa, was arrested on 22/10/2004. Her old-aged father accounted" when the Israeli troops came to arrest my daughter they ordered the inhabitants of the house at gunpoint out in the open air they did not respect my elderly age , they demanded me to strip off my clothes." he added" they deprived my daughter to pass the secondary school exams."

Her mother is very worried about her " I did not feel a sleep at night , I spend all the night thinking of my daughter." She added "if they demolish my house it would be less gravity than taking my daughter. In last fating month (Ramadan) we were sitting to break our fast, crying her absence."

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