Israel 'holding Palestinian minors'

Rights group says Israel detained at least 81 minors between November 2009 and October 2010 mostly for stone throwing.

Al-Jazeera

"An Israeli human rights group has accused the police of arresting Palestinian minors as young as five in east Jerusalem and dealing with them in ways that violate the country's laws, as well as international laws.

In a report released on Monday, B'Tselem has said Israeli police arrested at least 81 Palestinian minors between November 2009 and October 2010 on suspicion of throwing stones at Israelis in the Silwan neighbourhood near Jerusalem's Old City.

"The Jerusalem Police systematically violates the law, primarily the Youth Law, which grants minors special rights in criminal matters and prohibits, as a rule, interrogation of minors at night," the group said.

The report said many arrests were made at night, "by taking the minors from their beds and rushing them to interrogation... in most cases in order to obtain information on incidents that occurred a few days earlier."

It also accused police interrogators of illegally preventing parents from attending the questioning of their children, and said many minors complained of violent treatment during their arrests.

"Their complaints of violence were disregarded or treated with scorn, and in the isolated cases in which the Department for the Investigation of Police opened an investigation, it was closed without any proceedings being taken against the persons responsible."....."