2 July 2021

Middle East

• On 30 June, Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association issued the paper “Torture and Ill-Treatment Beyond Interrogation: Violent Raids Against Palestinian Prisoners in Israeli Occupation Prisons” to mark the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture. Addameer sought to highlight an underexamined, yet blatant case of torture and ill-treatment against Palestinian prisoners, in light of the recent raid in Ofer Prisons and the closing of investigation in the previous Naqab raid. Addameer called, among others, on the ICC to initiate investigations into the situation of Palestine for crimes against humanity and war crimes, taking into account the multitude of forms of torture and ill-treatment systematically perpetrated against Palestinian prisoners and detainees.

• On 29 June, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) informed it had sent four joint written submissions, with partner Palestinian organizations, on vital human rights issues affecting the Palestinian people, prior to the 47th regular session of the UN Human Rights Council currently being held from 21 June to 15 July. According to CIHRS, the four interventions highlighted Israel’s ongoing dispossession of Palestinians, its systematic arbitrary arrests and detention campaigns on both sides of the Green Line, the failure to update annually the UN database of businesses operating in Israeli settlements, and Israel’s entrenchment of its apartheid regime over the Palestinian people.

• On 28 June, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) started a training program on the mechanisms for preparing and writing reports submitted to international committees “Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) as a model.” Twenty-five members representing 12 civil society organizations operating in the field of defending women’s rights will attend the 50-hour program that will take place over the course of 10 days.

• On 27 June, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) issued a press release to condemn the use of collective punishment on the Gaza population by Israel, including enhanced restrictions on the movement of imports and exports to and from Gaza. PCHR said that Israeli authorities recently imposed “impossible conditions on merchants and farmers from Gaza” demanding they remove the green stem off tomatoes before export and that the condition followed a ban on exports for over a month following the conclusion of Israeli airstrikes on the Strip.

• On 28 June, Physicians for Human Rights Israel published the position paper “Israel’s Responsibility to Guarantee the Right to Health for Palestinians in the OPT”, in which the NGO demands that Israel in the immediate future allows free and open passage between the different parts of the OPT, enables the Palestinian healthcare system to function as a single unit, cancels the permit regime, ends the blockade on the Gaza Strip, and provides funding for medical treatments that are unavailable in the OPT. The paper also stresses that the right to health for Palestinians will not be fully guaranteed until Palestinians’ civil and political rights, both as individuals as a national collective, are realized.

• On 26 June, Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights issued a press release on the occasion of the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture. Al Mezan said that throughout the OPT, particularly in the Gaza Strip, Palestinians experience significant exposure to torture because of the persistent absence of adequate protection mechanisms, the prevalence of Israel’s culture of impunity, and the inability of Palestinian victims to access justice due to the legal and judicial obstacles enforces by the Israeli authorities. It called on the international community to take concrete steps to put pressure on Israel so that it finally incorporates the absolute prohibition of torture into its legislation and guarantee redress for victims.

• On 24 June, HaMoked – Centre for the Defence of the Individual issued a press release denouncing the decision of Israel’s High Court of Justice to approve the punitive demolition of a West Bank home of a Palestinian woman and her three children following an attack allegedly perpetrated by the children’s father. HaMoked denounced the decision as part of an “immoral policy of explicit collective punishment, wilfully harming innocent people, including minors.” The NGO lamented that although the use of collective punishment is prohibited under international law, the High Court had refused time and again to review the principled issue raised by HaMoked in its petitions to prevent implementation of punitive demolition orders.

• On 24 June, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) released its Annual Report 2020 addressing the state of human rights and international humanitarian law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and PCHR’s program activities in 2020 on the national and international levels.

Europe

• On 25 June, the European Coordination of Committees and Associations for Palestine (ECCP) informed it had sent a joint open letter to the European Commission to raise concern about the political instrumentalization of the fight against antisemitism. The letter was sent in anticipation of the EU’s “Comprehensive Strategy on Combating Antisemitism”. It called on the Commission to “acknowledge, reject and counter the political instrumentalization of the fight against antisemitism,” to “launch a serious and substantial dialogue with concerned civil society organizations” and to “reaffirm the Commission’s commitment to freedom of expression and to civic space for rights-based advocacy and activism on Israel-Palestine in the upcoming strategy on combating antisemitism.”

• On 24 June, Amnesty International criticized Israeli police for targeting Palestinians with discriminatory arrests, torture and unlawful force. Amnesty said it documented unnecessary and excessive force used by Israeli police to disperse Palestinian protests in response to forced evictions in East Jerusalem as well as against the Gaza offensive. It also criticized the police for failing to protect Palestinians from organized attacks by groups of armed Jewish supremacists, whose plans were often publicized in advance.

North America

• On 8 July, Americans for Peace Now (APN) will hold a webinar on Palestinian politics’ ongoing crisis with leading Palestinian pollster and political analyst Khalil Shikaki. The latter will comment on the recent developments on the Palestinian public arena following the violent eruption in May 2021 and deferral of general elections.

• On 1 July, J Street issued a press release to welcome the US House Appropriations Committee’s approval of the State, Foreign Operations and Related Programmes appropriations Bill that ensures assistance to Israel and the Palestinian people. J Street welcomed new provisions in the legislation that are an important first step toward ensuring that equipment purchased with US Foreign Military Financing is used in a manner consistent with US law and national security policies, including specifying that items may not be used in any way that undermines the prospects of a negotiated two-State solution.

• On 30 June, Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued the article “On Israel and Palestine, It is Time for Canada to Recognize Reality” ahead of Foreign Minister Marc Garneau’s visit to Israel and the West Bank to advance the two-State solution and a just and lasting peace. HRW said Canada had opposed the ICC exercising jurisdiction over serious crimes committed in the OPT and “lost sight of a dire problem that requires urgent and immediate redress.” HRW called on the Foreign Minister to press Israeli authorities to take steps to end apartheid and persecution.

United Nations

• On 1 July, the UN Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, with support from the Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC), held the International Conference on the Question of Jerusalem “Forced demographic change in Jerusalem – grave breaches and a threat to peace”, on Webex and livestreamed on UN TV. In the opening, USG DiCarlo called on Israel to cease house demolitions and evictions, and illegal settlement activities, and reiterated the call to all sides to uphold and respect the status quo of Jerusalem holy sites. Panellists – Ms. Lara Friedman (US), Mr. Michael Lynk (UN Special Rapporteur), Ms. Suma Qawasmi (East Jerusalem), Ms. Nivine Sandouka (East Jerusalem) and Ms. Emily Schaeffer Omer-Man (Israel) – highlighted decades-long Israeli policies and actions to promote Jewish settlement into and Palestinian emigration from Jerusalem, enabled by a legal system ignoring international law and excluding the political context of a power imbalance between Jewish Israelis and Palestinians. The young Palestinian representatives outlined their daily struggles and peaceful resistance, highlighting the power of social media and international support. Pointing out that the longstanding impunity for Israeli actions had enabled the current situation, speakers and Member States called on the international community to replace words of support with actions to hold Israel accountable.

• On 30 June, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini delivered an opening statement at the virtual meeting of the Advisory Commission, underlining that the Agency has operated on three zero-growth budgets over the last six years, including for 2021, and that despite years of austerity and cost control measures UNRWA staff continue to innovate and adapt to the changing operational environment, as demonstrated during the pandemic. He appealed to all partners to explore all possible ways and means to provide additional support to the Agency, advance planned contributions or redirect contributions from other portals to the Programme Budget by mid- August, including considering creative avenues such as long-term loans. He said that while acknowledging the highly political and politicized environment that UNRWA operates in, it was unacceptable to constantly be accused of irrational allegations such as incitement to violence or anti-Semitism, and that the Agency had zero-tolerance for incitement, hatred or discrimination in any shape or form and will spare no effort to uphold humanitarian principles and UN values and continue to strengthen the adherence of our staff and our education content to these values and principles.

This newsletter informs about recent and upcoming activities of Civil Society Organizations affiliated with the United Nations Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. The Committee and the Division for Palestinian Rights of the UN Secretariat provide the information “as is” without warranty of any kind, and do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, or reliability of the information contained in the websites linked in the newsletter.