Israel issued more than 8700 administrative orders against Palestinians since 2015 – Prisoner Society

05-03-2022

Israel issued more than 8700 administrative detention orders against Palestinian activists, whether they were social, political or academic, since 2015, today said the Palestinian Prisoner Society (PPS). It said the orders affected all sectors of the Palestinian society including children, women and elderly. Currently, added PPS, there are more than 500 Palestinians held in administrative detention in Israel without charge or trial and for various periods of time, including one woman, but most of them are former prisoners who had spent several years in prison for their resistance of the Israeli occupiers. It said the highest number of orders issued since 2015 was 1742 issued in 2016. The PPS said administrative detainees have fought hard over the years against this cruel, illegal, and internationally-denounced policy, including long hunger strikes until they regained their freedom. It said that 400 detainees have gone on hunger strike in protest against their prolonged administrative detention since 2011, and in 2014 the detainees observed a mass hunger strike that went on for 62 days. As part of their struggle against the policy of administrative detention, the 500 current detainees have been boycotting Israeli courts for the 64th day in a row to protest the courts’ blind support of this policy when they rubber-stamp the decision of the Israeli military establishment to hold Palestinians in administrative detention for several months at a time that gets extended several times and based on secret evidence not known to the victims or their lawyers. The Israeli human rights organization, B’Tselem described this policy as such: “Administrative detention is incarceration without trial or charge, alleging that a person plans to commit a future offense. It has no time limit, and the evidence on which it is based is not disclosed. Israel employs this measure extensively and routinely, and has used it to hold thousands of Palestinians for lengthy periods of time. While detention orders are formally reviewed, this is merely a semblance of judicial oversight, as detainees cannot reasonably mount a defense against undisclosed allegations. Nevertheless, courts uphold the vast majority of orders.”

Reference:
http://english.wafa.ps/Pages/Details/128283