Adalah to Attorney General: Imposing Additional Restrictions on Palestinian Political Prisoners and Turning Them into Hostages as Revenge for the Failure of the Prisoner Release Deal is Immoral and Illegal
On 19 March 2009, Adalah sent an urgent letter to the Israeli Attorney General demanding that he take immediate action to avert any attempt to impose further restriction on the rights of Palestinian political prisoners incarcerated in Israeli prisons and detention centers. The letter was sent following Israeli news reports from 18 March 2009 that a special ministerial committee had been established to investigate further restrictions on the rights of Palestinian prisoners classified as “security prisoners” in response to the failure of the deal to release Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
In the letter, Adalah Attorney Abeer Baker argued that imposing additional restrictions on Palestinian prisoners as a reprisal for the failure of the deal was immoral and illegal. “Turning the prisoners into hostages and taking revenge on them in order to secure the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit is illegal and constitutes collective punishment, prohibited under international law,” Adalah contended.
Adalah emphasized that a series of restrictions have been imposed by the Israeli authorities on Palestinian political prisoners since the capture of Shalit on 25 June 2006, most significantly the ban on family visits to prisoners from Gaza who are incarcerated inside Israel.
There are approximately 10,000 Arab prisoners being held in Israeli prisons and detention centers who are classified by the Israel Prison Service as “security prisoners”. They are deprived of their rights in prison on a daily basis, in particular prisoners from Gaza. Moreover, Palestinian prisoners have been transferred from their places of residence to within the borders of the State of Israel in violation of international law.
