Palestinian Lapdog Tortures its Own People to please Israel and the United States

Palestinian Solidarity Campaign Should Cut All Links with PA

This shocking report comes from the Arab Organisation for Human Rights in Britain and the London-based Middle East Monitor. It outlines abuse of detainees in the West Bank, including the types of torture used by Palestinian Authority (PA) security services against detainees, as well as a description of US and Jordanian participation in the training of the perpetrators, and a critique of the EU's role in funding PA security services. The report covers cases from October 2007 to October 2010.

It is important to understand that the European Union is the largest funder of these security services and the United States provides them with training at its Police International Training Centre near Amman in Jordan. Recruits are vetted for any links with ‘terrorist’ groups, i.e. any Palestinian resistance organisations. The Palestinian security services therefore consist of the scum of Palestinian society, the most degenerate and criminal types, hand picked by the United States and Israel.

Apart from being shocking in itself, 95% of security service detainees are tortured and all of them, without exception are subject to some ill-treatment, this Report should have political consequences. No longer can or should Palestinian solidarity organisations in Britain turn a blind eye and pretend nothing untoward is happening. This is a quisling regime which has been sub-contracted by the United States and Israel in the not-so-gentle arts of repressing their own peoples. To give the creatures who run the Palestinian Authority any support whatsoever is to undermine the Palestinian struggle still further. The Palestinian Authority, the bastard child of the Oslo Accords, is one more weapon that Zionism and Western Imperialism employ in the subjugation of the Palestinian people.

As the Wiki Leaks documents have shown 'Palestinian Leaders Weak and Increasingly Desperate' [Observer 23rd January 2011] the Palestinian Authority have been treated with all the contempt they deserve by the Zionists. Saeb Erekat goes into negotiations willing to sign everything away because he has no cards to play except increasing the misery and torture of his own people. Erekat, Abbas and co. are interested in nothing more than becoming yet another Arab regime, preying and leaching on its people.

But they are not the only guilty ones. Those who deliberately and consciously foster illusions in these parasites and seek to pretend that nothing is amiss, are equally complicit. In particular the leadership of Palestine Solidarity Campaign in Britain, whose silence is becoming deafening. Our demands should be simple – the complete dismantling of the Palestinian Authority as an arm of the Israeli State and the distribution of its weapons to ordinary Palestinians so they may defend themselves against the settlers and Israeli army.

Those who say we should not criticise the PA for fear of playing into Zionist hands miss the point - the PA is itself the rabid offspring of Zionism.

And they also miss the point that supporters of the Palestinians can hardly condemn Israel for its use of torture and then ignore the barbaric practices of the security forces of the Palestinian Authority, whose operations are directed solely at other Palestinians in the service of Israel.

Tony Greenstein

Documenting the crime of torture in the Palestinian Authority’s Territories

Introduction

The Arab Organization for Human Rights in Britain has issued several reports on human rights violations in the territory of the Palestinian Authority highlighting the practice of torture in prisons. It is clear that the Palestinian security services have been using torture on a wide and systematic basis for several years using, inter alia, the following techniques: shabh (hanging) of all kinds, beating with cables, pulling out nails, suspension from the ceiling, flogging, kicking, swearing and cursing, electric shocks, sexual harassment and the threat of rape. At least six people have been killed while undergoing torture in Palestinian Authority centres: Shadi Shaheen, Ramallah; Majd Barghouti, Ramallah; Mohammed al-Haj, Jenin; Kamal Abu Taima, Hebron; Haitham Amro, Hebron; Fadi Hamadna, Nablus. Many ex-detainees have permanent disabilities. Mass arrests have taken place on political grounds.

Given the ongoing torture in the prisons of the Palestinian Authority, on a large scale and systematically, the Arab Organization for Human Rights in Britain has documented such crimes for the three years from October 2007 to October 2010. The work was based on several primary sources:

1. Meetings with victims or their relatives to find out what happened to them in custody and written testimonies of the victims explaining what they had been subjected to.

2. Distributing a questionnaire, in secret, to detainees in prisons.

3. The analysis of data and figures about detention and torture during the period mentioned.

Video testimonies of victims or their relatives.

We have taken these steps discreetly, away from the eyes of the security services. Where requested, some of the victims or witnesses have been promised anonymity so that they will not face further persecution.

An analysis of the data shows that in the period under review, the security services detained almost 8,640 people at a rate of 8 arrests per day; on occasions, there were between 600-900 arrests in the space of a few days. Every one of those detainees has been subject to humiliating and degrading treatment and stayed in cells for more than ten days. Many have spent the prime of their youth behind bars. The analysis also shows that an astonishing 95% of the detainees were subjected to severe torture, others feeling the detrimental effects on their health for varying periods. Seventy-seven percent of the detainees had been in the custody of the occupation before being released and rearrested by the Palestinian Authority on the same charges.

Men and women from all sectors of Palestinian society have been subject to arrest and torture: students, workers, teachers, doctors, engineers, university professors and lawyers. Like their Israeli counterparts, the Palestinian security services also detain minors.

There is no sanctity for the house, university or school; even hospitals are violated. Raids with personnel wearing civilian and military clothing take place in the middle of the night; citizens are abducted from their places of work or study in broad daylight. Arrests themselves are harsh and often accompanied by verbal insults and physical beatings; detainees’ homes are ransacked and all too often valuables are stolen by the security forces. It is rare for an arrest warrant to be shown, the reasons for the arrest to be explained or the detainees’ rights to be read out. The mandatory court hearing within 24 hours of arrest does not usually take place and the victim is subject to torture and interrogation from the moment he is detained.