Monday, March 8, 2010

Israel: End Crackdown on Anti-Wall Activists




Peaceful Advocates Detained on Spurious Charges, Denied Due Process

"(Jerusalem) - Israel should immediately end its arbitrary detention of Palestinians protesting the separation barrier, Human Rights Watch said today. Israel is building most of the barrier inside the West Bank rather than along the Green Line, in violation of international humanitarian law. In recent months, Israeli military authorities have arbitrarily arrested and denied due process rights to several dozen Palestinian anti-wall protesters.

Israel has detained Palestinians who advocate non-violent protests against the separation barrier and charged them based on questionable evidence, including allegedly coerced confessions. Israeli authorities have also denied detainees from villages that have staged protests against the barrier, including children, access to lawyers and family members. Many of the protests have been in villages that lost substantial amounts of land when the barrier was built.....

Israeli military authorities have detained scores of Palestinians, including children, involved in protests against the wall. According to the Palestinian prisoners' rights group Addameer, 35 residents of Bil'in have been arrested since June 2009, most during nighttime raids; 113 have been arrested from the neighboring village of Ni'ilin in the last 18 months......."

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