RAMALLAH, September 9, 2015
(WAFA) – Israeli prison guards recently cracked down on minor political prisoners
in Sharon prison and used pepper spray against some of them, according to Heba
Masalha, an attorney with the Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs (CPA).
Masalha said Israeli prison
authorities placed a number of Israeli criminal prisoners with Palestinian
minor political prisoners in Sharon prison, a matter which enraged the minors, because
they were subjected to assault by the Israeli prisoners, including verbal and
physical.
Ameen Zeyadeh, who represents
minor prisoners at Sharon, told Masalha the Israeli prisoners regularly provoke
the minors and treat them aggressively, stirring unrest among minor prisoners who
knocked at the doors and windows in protest of this mistreatment.
In return, prison guards
attacked the minors and pepper-sprayed them, causing them intense itching in their
faces and eyes. The prison authorities also considered a number of reprisal
measures against the minors, including restrictions on the entry of food as
well as on the use of prison store.
Some prisoners were also placed
in solitary confinement in retaliation for knocking on the doors and windows.
Masalha also reported on the
testimony of minor prisoners who were exposed to torture during detention and
investigation.
Fifteen-year-old Ziad Natsheh,
from the Jerusalem neighborhood of al-Thawri, told Masalha he was severely
beaten by Israeli police officers upon detention on May 12. Natsheh was
eye-folded, handcuffed, verbally abused, and repeatedly beaten on his head as
well as assaulted with a chair during investigation, he told Masalha.
Meanwhile, sixteen-year-old
Khaled Maswaddeh from Jerusalem also told Masalha he was ruthlessly beaten and
verbally abused when he was detained in May 4. He was also assaulted during investigation,
despite of his bad health condition; he suffers from low heart beats.
Meanwhile, CPA said the highest
rate of minor detainees was reported last August, during which 42 Palestinian
minors, including 13 below the age of 15, were arrested by the Israeli
authorities.
Akram Hamed, who represents
minor prisoners at Ofer prison, said six minor prisoners in Ofer are sick,
while eight others were exposed to physical torture and beating during their
detention. Twenty six minors, he told CPA, were also subjected to a vigorous
investigation, which included the use of violence.
Hamed also said August saw the
highest rate of imprisonment sentences against minor Palestinian detainees
ranging between six and 19 months in jail. Fines imposed on Palestinian minors
also amounted to 40 thousand shekels (about $10,000) in August alone.
On January 19, an
attorney with the committee reported that Palestinian minor prisoners
incarcerated in Israeli jails are routinely subjected to physical torture
during their arrest and interrogation as well as in detention.
“By the end of
January 2014, it was reported that a total of 183 Palestinian children were
prosecuted and detained in the Israeli court system, a rise of 18.8% over the
month. The figure includes twenty children between the ages of 14 and 15,”
reported the Middle East Monitor in a story.
“Around 500 - 700
Palestinian children, some as young as 12, are arrested, detained and
prosecuted in the Israeli military detention system each year. The majority of
Palestinian child detainees are charged with throwing stones. No Israeli
children come into contact with the military court system,” said Defense for
Children International (DCI).
Israel is the only
state to automatically and systematically prosecute children in military courts
that lack basic standards of due process. More than 200 minor prisoners are
currently incarcerated in Israeli jails.
M.N/M.H
