News briefing
Translated and edited by: Committee for Justice
Geneva: 27 March 2022
The Human Rights Council in Geneva concluded its general debate under its agenda item seven on the human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab Territories. Speakers reiterated their firm position in support of the Palestinian cause, and that the human rights of the Palestinian people have been systematically and consistently violated by Israel. Speakers also reiterated their support for the two-State solution within the pre-1967 borders and with East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.
Israel established an apartheid regime:
Michael Lynk, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, said that the report addressed the question as to whether Israel’s acquisitive and repressive practices over the course of its 55-year-old regime had curdled from an endless occupation into something darker, harsher and more ominous.
Lynk concluded that the political system of entrenched rule in the occupied Palestinian territory satisfied the prevailing evidentiary standard for the existence of apartheid. First, an institutionalised regime of systematic racial oppression and discrimination has been established.
“This system of alien rule had been established with the intent to maintain the domination of one racial-national-ethnic group over another. And third, the imposition of this system of institutionalised discrimination with the intent of permanent domination had been built upon the regular practice of inhuman(e) acts,” he added.
Increase in human rights violations:
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, indicated in her report to the Council that the human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territory further deteriorated during the reporting period, and violations of international humanitarian law continued and increased.
Bachelet said that Israel’s continued use of collective punishment practices, which are prohibited under international humanitarian law, violates a number of human rights, adding that “the blockade imposed on Gaza, now in its fifteenth year, continues to severely damage the rights of all the civilian population.”
The report also highlights the new repressive measures of the Israeli authorities against civil society. On October 19, the Israeli authorities designated six prominent Palestinian human rights and human rights organizations as “terrorist organizations”, based on vague and baseless allegations. Israel has also carried out arbitrary arrests and criminal prosecutions of human rights defenders; Including women human rights defenders. Adding that Israel has restricted people’s movement, carried out searches and shutdowns of civil society organizations, dispersed peaceful demonstrations, launched attacks against journalists, and restricted civic space on the internet.
Bachelet also clarified that the number of Palestinian children held by Israel and in administrative detention has increased significantly compared to the period covered by the previous report.
