RAMALLAH, June 21, 2026 (WAFA) – The Palestinian Prisoners Society (PPS) said that 65 high school students, according to data from the Ministry of Education, remain in Israeli custody and have been unable to sit for this year’s secondary school examinations.
Since the beginning of the genocide, these students have faced harsh conditions, including torture, ill-treatment, and deprivation of their families and one of their most fundamental rights: the right to education.
In a statement, the PPS added that Israeli authorities have intensified arrest campaigns targeting students at various educational levels. It added that rights previously secured by Palestinian prisoners—including access to education—have been removed, and that detention conditions have significantly deteriorated.
It also said that the prisoners' right to education has been one of the most prominent rights they have struggled to establish for many years, despite repeated attempts by the prison administration to deny it to them.
Despite these policies, the prisoners managed to solidify and preserve this right. However, with the onset of the genocide, the prison system stripped them of all their rights and transformed prisons into open spaces for torture and abuse around the clock.
The Prisoners' Club affirmed that the prison system today practices a comprehensive policy based on systematic torture, humiliation, and abuse, aimed at breaking the prisoners psychologically and physically.
It called on international human rights organizations and relevant UN bodies concerned with human rights, children's rights, and the right to education to assume their responsibilities regarding the escalating crimes committed against detained Palestinian students.
It urged them to act urgently to pressure the occupying authorities to halt their policy of targeting students and depriving them of their right to education, to ensure the protection of imprisoned children and students, and to end the systematic torture policies that flagrantly violate international humanitarian law, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
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