2021-12-02

West Bank

West Bank / Core Program / position paper

Admitting A Mistake and Subsequent Apology Is Not Enough to Address Sin and Crime

It is required to hold the aggressors accountable, remove them from their jobs, and to abolish the policy of repression and violence in dealing with citizens.

The media outlets and social media platforms have reported that the head of the General Intelligence Service, Major General Majed Faraj, stated that the behavior of agents of his agency featuring violence during the arrest the citizen Islambouli Bedair and terrorizing his wife and child while they were walking in a street in the city of Tulkarm in a normal and peaceful way, and his contact with the aforementioned citizen who was released after being arrested and severely beaten by masked members of the intelligence service, apologizing for what he described as a mistake.

We, MUSAWA – The Palestinian Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Profession, consider that describing the crime and the sin as a mistake is insufficient; and that the apology does not amount to accountability and does not express the reversal, retreat and cessation of the method of using violence, violating the provisions of the law, abuse of power, inferior treatment of citizens, and violating their physical integrity and human dignity. Rather, it is necessary to explicitly acknowledge the futility of the use of the policy of the repressive security approach in dealing with citizens, and to submit the issuer of the order and those executing such a crime to the judiciary for criminal accountability, in addition to terminating their work and dismissing them from their jobs within the framework of their due administrative accountability. In addition, to issue clear instructions that guarantee and ensure repealing this policy and reversing that approach, and immediately stopping all forms of harassment and infringement of people’s rights, security and freedoms. Also, the security services and the government’s assumption of their responsibility and obligating them to compensate the victims, and stopping any procedures related to their arrest, detention, lockup or trial.

While noting the grave harm and breach involved in the repressive treatment of citizens, and putting on a mask by the security forces carrying out these attacks, which all colors of the Palestinian spectrum had previously committed themselves during the first intifada not to use the masks while dealing with citizens and declared their rejection of that use. Furthermore, they even criminalized the use and referred those who wore it to political, administrative and judicial accountability and limiting it, if necessary, to dealing with the occupying soldiers only.

Accordingly, we demand that those who committed the assault and those who issued the order be brought to trial, administratively questioned, and dismissed from their job, in addition to declaring all relevant official bodies a complete halt to the approach of superiority and oppression in dealing with citizens under penalty of accountability and dismissal from office.

What is required is the stoppage of the approach, to hold human rights violators accountable, to remove them from their jobs, and to compensate the victims so that the tragedy of compromising civil peace and individual and collective security is not repeated and so that the prestige of the state is not affected. Also, so that the prestige of the state is not compromised, the principle of the rule of law is trampled on, and the reputation and trust of the international community in the State of Palestine is destroyed while the State of Palestine is labeled as a state that is outside the requirements and guarantees of the human and constitutional rights of its citizens.

MUSAWA

Lawyers for the Rule of Law

Lawyers for Justice

Issued on: 02/12/2021