On World Children’s Day marking November 20

The Commission of Detainees’ Affairs and the Palestinian Society Prisoner’s Club review the conditions of children detainees in time of Genocide

November 20, 2024
Ramallah _ The Commission of Detainees’ Affairs and the Palestinian Society Prisoner’s Club stated that Palestinian children are facing the bloodiest phase in history, with the ongoing war of extermination and the systematic operations of erasing, that led to the martyrdom of thousands of them, besides thousands of injured and thousands of children who lost members of their families or the entire family.

The Commission and the Society emphasized, in a report issued on the occasion of the World Children’s Day marking November 20, that the level of cruelty practiced against our children by the Israeli occupation constitutes the most prominent goals of the ongoing war of extermination, which has persisted for more than 400 days.
This cruelty forms an extension of targeting children which is practiced since decades, but the current variable is the level and intensity of the committed crimes.
The issue of detainees held in Israeli prisons and detention camps, including women and children, is one of the genocide objectives, through practicing systematic and organized crimes represented in torture, starvation, medical crimes, and sexual abuse, that led to the martyrdom of tens of detainees.
The issue of children detainees witnessed significant shifts since the onset of genocide, with an escalation in arrest campaigns, as (770) arrests have been recorded in the West Bank, in addition to children from Gaza, whose the organizations could not obtain accurate information on their numbers due to the crime of enforced disappearance.
(270) children are currently held in Israeli prisons in (Megiddo and Ofer prisons) besides the military camps.
Over more than (400) days of genocide, the legal teams were able to manage visits to several children in (Ofer and Megiddo) prisons, despite the restrictions on visits. Tens of testimonies have been obtained, which reflected the brutality practiced against them. They were exposed to systematic torture crimes and unprecedented rights violations.

 /2024/videos/On_World_Childrens_Day.pdf

On World Children’s Day marking November 20
The Commission of Detainees’ Affairs and the Palestinian Society
Prisoner’s Club review the conditions of children detainees in time of
Genocide
November 20, 2024
Ramallah _ The Commission of Detainees’ Affairs and the Palestinian Society
Prisoner’s Club stated that Palestinian children are facing the bloodiest phase in
history, with the ongoing war of extermination and the systematic operations of
erasing, that led to the martyrdom of thousands of them, besides thousands of
injured and thousands of children who lost members of their families or the entire
family.
The Commission and the Society emphasized, in a report issued on the occasion
of the World Children’s Day marking November 20, that the level of cruelty
practiced against our children by the Israeli occupation constitutes the most
prominent goals of the ongoing war of extermination, which has persisted for more
than 400 days.
This cruelty forms an extension of targeting children which is practiced since
decades, but the current variable is the level and intensity of the committed crimes.
The issue of detainees held in Israeli prisons and detention camps, including women
and children, is one of the genocide objectives, through practicing systematic and
organized crimes represented in torture, starvation, medical crimes, and sexual
abuse, that led to the martyrdom of tens of detainees.
The issue of children detainees witnessed significant shifts since the onset of
genocide, with an escalation in arrest campaigns, as (770) arrests have been
recorded in the West Bank, in addition to children from Gaza, whose the
organizations could not obtain accurate information on their numbers due to the
crime of enforced disappearance.
(270) children are currently held in Israeli prisons in (Megiddo and Ofer prisons)
besides the military camps.
Over more than (400) days of genocide, the legal teams were able to manage visits
to several children in (Ofer and Megiddo) prisons, despite the restrictions on visits.
Tens of testimonies have been obtained, which reflected the brutality practiced
against them. They were exposed to systematic torture crimes and unprecedented
rights violations.
We hereby present a series of statistical data on children detention and the
conditions of their detention:
Since the onset of genocide, as we mentioned earlier, (770) children under age of
18 from the West Bank have been arrested by the Israeli occupation.
This data includes those who are still detained and released ones.
At least 270 children are still detained in the occupation’s prisons, aged between
14 and 17. There is no accurate data on the number of children arrested from
Gaza due to the ongoing crime of enforced disappearance in military camps under
the occupation's control.
The numbers of child arrests recorded are not the only indicator on the shifts in the
policy of targeting children through arrests. Similar figures of arrests among children
in the West Bank were encountered in previous phases, including the period
following the popular uprisings. However, this statistic primarily reflects the
escalation of systematic crimes and violations against them.
The most prominent of these crimes include severe beatings and various levels of
threats. Statistics and documented testimonies of detained children indicate that
the majority of arrested children were exposed to one or more forms of physical
and psychological torture through a series of systematic methods that violate laws,
international norms, and conventions on children's rights.
Moreover, there have been extrajudicial executions accompanying arrest
campaigns, including deliberate and direct shootings at children. Additionally,
several cases were documented where the occupation forces used children as
hostages to force family members to surrender.
A case in point, detaining a three-year-old child from the town of Beit Liqya in
Ramallah for an hour and a half before releasing him, and then his father
surrendered himself to the occupation forces.
Children were also exposed to field execution operations in Palestinian cities, towns
and refugee camps, afflicting thousands of citizens since the beginning of war. The
Israeli intelligence tried to exploit children and abuse them for collaboration,
especially in areas that witness high confrontations with the Israeli forces.
Additionally, children are subjected to systematic firm policies since the moment of
their arrest, through detention and then imprisonment. These policies are
represented in arresting them late at night, where tens of heavily armed soldiers
storm their houses and destroying houses’ belongings. Many of these children were
injured and sick , where soldiers treated them in a degrading manner and held
them in tragic conditions in detention centers under the control of the Israeli army.
They exposed children to intense beat, curses, threats, assaults, and deprivation
of food and using the toilet for long hours, in an attempt to pressure them to force
them confess guilt. Moreover, children are forced to sign papers written in Hebrew,
which they do not comprehend.
The occupation continues its violations and crimes against children inside prisons
through many measures, such as starvation and repeated assaults, including raids
on prison sections by prison units and occupation army units. Several incidents of
such raids targeting children sections have been documented by the Commission
of Detainees’ Affairs, the Palestinian Society Prisoners’ Club, and other specialized
organizations after the war. During these raids, heavily armed forces stormed the
children's sections, assaulting them physically, leaving many injured, in addition to
depriving tens of sick and injured detainees of treatment. Some of them suffer from
chronic diseases.
It could be confirmed that the crime of starvation imposed on detainees, including
children, has been repeated in their testimonies since the war. Hunger has engulfed
children’s sections at an unprecedented level, which forced many of them to fadt
and endure days without food.
What the prison administration called "meals" are, in reality, mere scraps.
For decades, adult detainees had worked to consolidate supervisory systems within
the sections to ensure some form of care for the younger detainees.
However, this system is no longer existing, leaving the prison administration free to
exploit and isolate child detainees without oversight. The care detainees tried to
provide has been erased by the prison administration.
During the previous months, children detainees have been suffering from skin
diseases, most notably scabies, which has become a health disaster spreading
across multiple prison sections. The occupation has used this health crisis to torture
detainees including children, by denying access to treatment and intentionally
neglecting measures to stop the spread of the disease. We followed up on a case
of a child from Jerusalem, who was released in a dire health condition due to the
disease. His release came only after extensive legal efforts and under strict
conditions, including house arrest and banishment from his family home.
The occupation also continues its crimes against children through biased judicial
processes, subjecting them to trials lacking basic guarantees of fairness, similar to
those faced by all detainees. In the West Bank, children are prosecuted in Israeli
military courts, which have long been a primary tool for consolidation of crimes
against children and detainees in general. These courts have been exposed,
particularly in light of the recent genocidal war, issuing sentences and decisions
that reveal their oppressive nature.
A similar reality exists in Israeli civil courts handling cases of Palestinian children
from Jerusalem. These courts operate under the Israeli Juvenile Law but apply it
discriminatorily, stripping Jerusalemite children of their most basic rights. The courts
turn exceptions into standard practices when dealing with these children. For years,
the rate of child arrests in Jerusalem has been the highest compared to other
geographical areas in the West Bank. Furthermore, the occupation continues to
expand its policy of house arrest, which has become a nightmare for dozens of
Jerusalemite families. The policy includes imposing electronic ankle bracelets on
many children under house arrest, subjecting them to constant surveillance that is
no less severe than the harsh conditions they endure in prisons. This policy turns
their family homes into prisons and their relatives into jailers.
One of the most alarming developments has been the escalation of administrative
detention targeting children. This trend correlates with the unprecedented rise in
overall administrative detention since the start of the war. The number of
administrative detainees has reached 4.343, an unprecedented figure even during
the peak confrontations in the two major intifadas in Palestinian history. Today, the
occupation holds around 100 children under administrative detention based on socalled
"secret files." Additionally, the occupation continues to detain children from
Gaza, classifying them as "illegal fighters”.
According to the data provided by the Prison Administration, the number of
detainees from Gaza stands at 1,627—this being the only figure recently
announced by the occupation regarding Gaza detainees. We emphasize that the
crime of administrative detention today, along with detentions based on so-called
"incitement," forms the foundation of all arrest campaigns in the West Bank.
In light of the high level of crimes committed by the occupation, Israel has worked
to consolidate many laws and draft laws aimed at denying the future of children.
Over the past years, racist laws targeting the fate of hundreds of detained children
have escalated through amendments made to juvenile laws, particularly after the
phase of popular uprisings.
There are many details relate to this issue, such as the approval of a law imposing
long sentences on children under the age of 14 under emergency laws, with
sentences lasting up to five years. This is not the first law enacted to impose longterm
sentences on children. Many children have been sentenced to life
imprisonment after reaching adulthood in detention. Many of today’s adult
detainees in occupation prisons were detained as children and later received life
sentences, remaining in detention for decades.
The occupying state is the only state in the world that systematically prosecutes
nearly 600–700 Palestinian children annually in its military courts.
In light of all the data presented, and during this most critical phase for the fate of
detained children, the international human rights system must reassess its role
concerning these developments. We must confront the facts imposed by this
genocide, given the evident exceptional status the occupying state enjoys and the
immunity that enables it to commit more crimes, destroy entire generations, rob
them of their future, and systematically harm them both physically and
psychologically.
General statistical data on children detention:
. More than 10,000 arrest cases against children have been recorded since 2015
. 770 children have been arrested since the onset of the war, with no accurate data
on children arrested from Gaza
. A female child from Jerusalem is under arrest
. 100 children are sentenced to administrative detention, including a 14-year-old
child
. Children families are deprived of visitation since the beginning of war, similar to
thousands of adults detainees
. Children are facing torture, starvation, medical crimes and the spread of scabies
disease, especially in minor’s section in Megiddo prison
. Many children suffer from psychological disorders after being released, and need
support, care and rehabilitation
. 169 children have been released on November 2023 under an exchange deal,
while 9 of them have been rearrested later.