Berikut adalah artikel yang diterbitkan awal tahun lalu oleh majalah Humanist di Amrik
dan adalah salah satu dari ‘resources’ di laporan dari Palestinian Human Rights
Monitoring Group.
Sesudah membaca laporan dari Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group yang adalah
orang Palestina sendiri, mungkin artikel berikut ini bisa dianggap cukup kredibel.,
dan bukannya dianggap tidak bisa dipercaya karena diterbitkan oleh majalah barat,
ter-lebih2 lagi Amrik.
Seperti dengan adanya kekerasan/kekejaman oleh orang Palestina terhadap orang
Palestina sendiri, begitupun di Irak sekarang ini, banyak sekali kekejaman yang di
lakukan oleh teroris terhadap orang Irak sendiri dimana korban orang Irak jauh lebih
banyak dari pada korban tentara koalisi.. Tetapi artikel dibawah bukan mengenai Irak,
melainkan mengenai Palestina.
--------------
http://www.thehumanist.org/humanist/articles/waakjf03.htm
Violence among the Palestinians.
Humanist, Jan-Feb, 2003, by Erika Waak
Underneath the surface of the highly publicized Israeli/Palestinian conflict lies
another level of suffering--one that is underreported and generally overlooked: the
violence and human rights violations perpetrated by Palestinians against other
Palestinians. This internal conflict affects the everyday lives of Palestinian people
living in the occupied territories as their rights are debased by their own judicial
system governed by the Palestinian Authority.
For over a decade the PA has violated Palestinian human rights and civil liberties by
routinely killing civilians--including collaborators, demonstrators, journalists, and
others--without charge or fair trial. Of the total number of Palestinian civilians
killed during this period by both Israeli and Palestinian security forces, 16 percent
were the victims of Palestinian security forces. More specifically, in the 1993
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, the government of Israel states that 139
Palestinians were killed by other Palestinians. In 1992 it was 182 and in 1991 it was
140.
As part of the Oslo Agreement between the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and
Israel, signed in September 1993, the PA agreed not to punish Palestinian civilians
and collaborators. Miranda Sissons, researcher for the Middle East and North Africa
division of Human Rights Watch, said in a personal interview that, as a result:
there were fewer street killings, but it still disappointed Human Rights Watch
standards. In the last five to six months, the situation has deteriorated--there has
been intensification, and Palestinian civilians are reacting with a great deal of
anger.
During the first intifada (uprising), which began in December 1987 and lasted until
mid-1992, there were hundreds of Palestinian civilians killed by Palestinian security
forces. Joel Himelfarb, assistant editorial page editor of the Washington Times, said
in an interview that graphic photos of victims in the Gaza strip were published by the
New York Times in its book the Near East Report.
Due to such crimes, some observers, including many within the Israeli government,
conclude that the Palestinians aren't capable of or ready for self-rule. Kenneth Roth,
executive director of Human Rights Watch, said, "The Palestinian Authority wants to be
treated as an equal with other governments. President Arafat must ensure that the PA
has a functioning judicial system which operates to protect the human rights of all
Palestinians." It isn't, however, surprising that such conditions should prevail.
Subject, oppressed, or embattled peoples throughout history have commonly turned on
themselves. The occupation and war conditions under which Palestinians currently live
readily foster internal hostility and the loss of civil liberties. In fact, we see
similar developments to a lesser degree in the United States as the armed-camp
mentality promoted by the government's War on Terrorism has created a pretext for
creeping, large-scale losses of traditional liberties followed by significant
violations. In both cases such developments need to be identified and addressed. And
in neither case does such exposure necessarily constitute a denial of real external
threats or a rejection of the legitimacy of responding to those threats.
Demonstrators and Journalists
According to Freedom House's annual survey of political rights and civil liberties,
Freedom in the World 2001-2002, the chaotic nature of the intifada along with strong
Israeli reprisals has resulted in a deterioration of living conditions for
Palestinians in Israeli-administered areas. The survey states:
Civil liberties declined due to: shooting deaths of Palestinian civilians by
Palestinian security personnel; the summary trial and executions of alleged
collaborators by the Palestinian Authority (PA); extra-judicial killings of suspected
collaborators my militias; and the apparent official encouragement of Palestinian
youth to confront Israeli soldiers, thus placing them directly in harm's way.
Groups of Palestinian civilians who are needlessly harassed, arrested, or killed by
the Palestinian security forces include demonstrators, journalists, and clan members.
It seems evident that any Palestinian civilian will encounter fatal opposition if she
or he expresses any opinion other than that of the government. For example, there were
reports of mass arrests when about thirty students were detained after a demonstration
at Birzeit University on February 26, 2001. Then on February 29 the PA initiated new
regulations, in contravention of existing law, that limited freedom of assembly. These
regulations included a penalty of up to two months imprisonment or a fine if
Palestinians organized processions, demonstrations, or public meetings without prior
approval from the district police commander.
Late in 2001 Palestinian demonstrators were killed when they violently clashed with
Palestinian security forces over the PA's detention of militants suspected of
masterminding attacks against Israelis. After the Israelis declared several ceasefires
and during demonstrations in Gaza in support of Osama bin Laden in early October of
2001, Palestinian president Yasser Arafat called upon Palestinians to refrain from
attacking Israelis. As a result Palestinian security forces chose not to open fire on
Israelis but rather decided to shoot Palestinian civilian protestors, killing three.
In a private interview Michael Goldfarb, senior press officer of Freedom House, said:
"Any demonstration against the PA is not tolerated, and Palestinians are sent to jails
and even shot and killed by security forces. Rocks are thrown, and the PA uses
firearms."
Journalists are also potential victims. Immediately following the September 11, 2001,
terrorist attacks on the United States, Palestinian security forces threatened
journalists covering Palestinian public celebrations on the West Bank. Palestinian
journalists covering the intifada also faced harassment by the PA; those publishing
stories deemed unfavorable were reportedly threatened. Broadcast media were frequently
closed that year, and journalists and commentators were arrested for reporting
criticism of PA policies, according to the Human Rights Watch 2001 world report
entitled Palestinian Authority: End Torture and Unfair Trials. Militias affiliated
with the PA have also tried to keep Israeli journalists out of Palestinian areas. In
January 2002 a cameraman based in Gaza was arrested for filming the execution of
accused collaborators.
Collaborators
The largest group of Palestinian civilians arrested and killed by the PA are those
accused of collaborating and providing information for Israel. Marti Rosenbluth,
Amnesty International's country specialist for israel and the occupied territories,
said in a an interview that Israelis have always had an extensive network of
collaborators; they use local Palestinians, usually those who are well known in the
community.
The PA society is fairly small and there is a lot of exaggeration about whois a
collaborator that isn't true. Very often Palestinians are cut a deal and paid if they
provide information. Threats are made, drugs are involved, or there may be a minor
security offence. The Israelis are able to track the movement of Palestinians and use
the information to get to these people. The Palestinian society acts vehemently toward
these individuals the collaborators].
The Palestinian Human Rights Monitor report entitled "Human Rights and Legal Position
of Palestinian `Collaborators'" published in 2001 explains why collaboration was such
a widespread phenomenon during the first intifada.
First, Palestinians depended to a great extent upon the Israelis both for their
livelihood and for all kinds of permits. Israel could and did use this dependency as a
lever to obtain the information it wanted.
Second,until the time of the first intifada, no clear directives were ever issued
by the Palestinian leadership as to what behavior was acceptable or not.
The third point relates to the Palestinian social structure itself and its basis on
the hamula, the extended family or clan.
Problems that emerged as a result of collaborators at the time of the first intifada
include Palestinian factions that comprised gangs of masked men who punished immoral
behavior and pursued alleged collaborators. The report states:
At the same time, Israel increasingly needed collaborators to track down wanted men
and to gather information in those areas that Israeli soldiers could not readily
access. In the midst of this vigilantism many innocent people--both women and
men--were mutilated or killed as well, merely upon the suspicion or rumor of
collaboration or as a result of a personal grudge or vendetta. [The first intifada]
was a time of terror in the occupied territories, where the most basic guarantees of
the rule of law were completely ignored.
In 1988, the early days of the first intifada, the Unified National Command required
that all Palestinians resign from the positions they held in the Civil Administration
and end all collaboration with Israel. However, because collaborators were such a
convenient way for Israel to obtain information in the Palestinian territories they
occupied, Moshe Arens, Israel's minister of defense from 1990-1992, employed a more
subtle policy that relied on the work of collaborators and undercover units. This led
to the regeneration of the original collaboration network. But the situation changed
once again with the establishment of the PA in 1994 and the creation of the
Palestinian security services.
But regardless of how well or poorly Israel's collaboration network functions, not
everyone accused of collaboration is actually a collaborator. In fact, according to
the Palestinian Human Rights Monitor, the definition of collaboration varies greatly
from one source to another. For example some Palestinian factions during the time of
the first intifada considered dealing in drugs or pornography as collaboration--under
the assumption that such immoral behavior undermined Palestinian society and diverted
it from the ideals of the uprising.
By the simplest definition, a collaborator is someone who has maintained contact with
the Israeli authorities. During the first intifada, Israel defined collaborators as
"Palestinians who are registered as having official intelligence contacts with one of
the security branches operating in the Territories--the General Security Services
(GSS), the Israel Police, the IDF, or the Civil Administration." This definition also
includes land sales agents who helped the government gain control of land in the
occupied territories. Since the establishment of the PA, however, it has become
difficult to identify any reliable definition of collaborators that is used
consistently. PA prisoners are put into three different categories: criminals,
political prisoners regarded as opponents of the peace process, and security prisoners
or collaborators. The Palestinian Human Rights Monitor states:
There is no formal, written description of what exactly is considered
collaboration, but according to Hamdi el-Rifi, Director of the Prisons for the West
Bank and Gaza, security prisoners are accused of either spying or selling land to the
Jews. In fact, it appears that the label of collaboration is applied even more
generously than this, to stigmatize whatever the regime dislikes. This comprises drug
dealing and addiction, since taking drugs weakens the Palestinian spirit and
therefore, as in a zero-sum game, favors the enemy's side.
In some cases criticism of the PA is considered collaboration because criticism is
felt to undermine Palestinian unity. Collaboration is a simple accusation that can be
used to justify actions motivated through personal interest. Settlement of accounts
within factions and families can be justified in similar terms. Steve Lipman, reporter
for the Jewish Week, notes that a lot of Palestinian civilians are armed and that
"different clans use violence as an excuse to get revenge against people that they
don't like."
In the Human Rights Watch report, the number of Palestinian collaborators killed was
lower when compared to the first intifada. But the exact numbers of collaborators are
impossible to determine since collaboration isn't a phenomenon willingly acknowledged
by most of its perpetrators; the number is probably higher than what is recorded.
Sissons said:
Since the [2001] report in November, I think that in April and May thirteen
collaborators were killed. In the last two months the number of Pales-tinian
collaborators that were killed is higher than in the last thirteen months and its
getting worse.
The dynamics are that the Palestinians have to blame someone for the violence. As a
result, some collaborators move to Israel for better treatment and become part of the
Israeli society, although they are despised by both the Israeli and PA sides.
Israeli security forces use collaborators to capture and arrest the wanted
Pales-tinian at their home. There may be three Israelis, the fourth person is the
Palestinian collaborator and is usually wearing black clothes and a black hood--it's
very graphical. The collaborator goes to the home of the wanted Palestinian and
identifies the people in the houses, and the wanted
Arrests and Investigations
The various Palestinian security forces have so much independence that suspects are in
practice deprived of judicial supervision of their detention. Arrests are made at the
discretion of the security forces without an arrest warrant from the attorney general,
no proper investigation is conducted beforehand, and the security forces rely on the
interrogation of the suspect to corroborate the charges. The Human Rights Watch report
says:
In practice no arrest warrant is usually issued before the arrest, although the
Attorney General's office has this responsibility. Some judges ... collaborate with
the security services and sign arrest warrants after the fact without investigating
the charges or interrogating the prisoners.
Judges [sign] blank warrants that the security services then use at their
discretion. The result is that collaborators are not officially charged and are,
therefore, kept outside the law.
Since both investigation and interrogation are carried out by the security services,
and interrogation is often used as a substitute for a proper investigation, suspects
are exposed to mistreatment. Torture also appears to be widely used during this
interrogation phase.
The various security forces of the Palestinian Authority carried out arbitrary
arrests of alleged Palestinian collaborators with Israel. Many were held in prolonged
detention without trial and tortured; others were sentenced to death after unfair
trials and two were executed. Both Israeli and Palestinian authorities failed to take
the necessary steps to stop the security forces ... from committing abuses.
As of September 2001 the PA was holding about 450 people in detention without charge
or trial. Most of these were suspected of being informants for Israeli security forces
and others were alleged to have sold Palestinian land to Israelis.
Prisoners
Based on testimonies gathered by human rights organizations, it appears that alleged
collaborators are almost invariably tortured, especially during the first phase of the
interrogation. The December 1997 issue of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitor
reported on eighteen people who died in custody, most of them seem to have been
accused of collaboration. The data at that time showed a total of twenty-three deaths
in custody since the establishment of the PA, including two cases in 1998, two in
1999, and one by July 2000. In the majority of these instances, death occurred in the
first weeks of detention and, of the twenty-three cases, at least twelve clearly
concerned alleged collaboration or land dealing. The PA's reasons for detaining the
accused are often difficult to determine, however, due to the absence of any official
charges. But two possible conclusions can be derived based on the number of alleged
collaborators among the cases of deaths in custody: either collaborators are more
vulnerable to harsh treatment by the security services or collaboration is a handy
label to make death in custody "acceptable" to both the public and the authorities.
By 2001 the PA hadn't released autopsy reports in twenty-one cases of deaths in
custody which had occurred in previous years. In the majority of these cases, no
independent autopsies were performed to determine the cause of death. And the PA
hasn't made the results of its own investigations public, nor has it pursued criminal
actions against those responsible. There are strong feelings on the street about those
who have been imprisoned, and Palestinian citizens have even broken into the jails to
free victims. According to the Human Rights Watch report, "The practice of
incommunicado detention exacerbates the routine use of torture. Detainees are
frequently subjected to "shabah" (prolonged sitting or standing in painful positions);
"falaqa" (beating on the soles of the feet); punching; kicking; and suspension from
the wrists."
Extra-Judicial Trials
Most Palestinians are arrested without charge or trial, and if they are given a trial
it usually lasts a very short period of time, typically less than one hour. Rosenbluth
said, "It's impossible to say if someone is wrongly accused. The PA offers very little
evidence when arresting Palestinian citizens." The proceedings give no legal rights to
the accused, who is always pronounced guilty. During most of the trials that include
criminal or collaborative cases, the alleged collaborator's punishment is carried out
extra-judicially and those who are prosecuted are guilty until proven innocent.
Freedom House's survey says:
Palestinian judges lack proper training and experience ... and [defendants] lack
almost all due process rights. Suspected Islamic militants are rounded up en masse and
often held without charge or trial. There are reportedly hundreds of administrative
detainees currently in Palestinian jails and detention centers. Defendants are not
granted the right to appeal sentences and are often summarily tried and sentenced to
death.
Obtaining legal assistance is extremely difficult for prisoners, and many lawyers
abandon cases after they realize that they can do nothing for the accused. Other
lawyers simply refuse to handle political or security prisoners in the first
place--one reason being that, in so doing, they could harm their image in front of the
PA. Collaboration seems such a contagious accusation that, understandably few want to
risk infection by defending those labeled as such. In the best situations, case files
are transferred to human rights organizations such as the Palestinian Center for Human
Rights in Gaza.
Amnesty International estimates that more than one hundred suspects of collaboration
are currently detained by the PA without charge or trial, and only two cases of
collaboration have actually been brought before the Palestinian supreme court for
judicial review. There is an absence of due process in legal proceedings in civilian
courts, and Human Rights Watch has sought to defend the independence of the judiciary
against pressure and interference by the executive branch of government. Israeli
responses to the current intifada, including the destruction of the Palestinian law
enforcement infrastructure and severe restrictions on freedom of movement, have
aggravated the deterioration of the Palestinian justice system.
Death Sentences
Palestinians are often executed because they allegedly cooperate with the Israelis.
But even if the convicted person receives a fair trial that positively proves his or
her actions, that individual shouldn't be executed. Rosenbluth argues:
The societies that practice the death penalty immediately send a signal that
violence is acceptable which causes a clear breakdown of civil society. The Israeli
government bears a part of the responsibility for the infrastructure of the
Palestinian security because Israelis have destroyed the police stations so that there
are no prisoners in the occupied territories. Those who are held in prisons are done
so for their own protection from being killed.
Some collaborators have been rounded up with no proof and killed or assassinated on
the spot--for example, Goldfarb said that a suspected collaborator in Bethlehem was
lynched, dragged, and then shot.
For alleged collaborators, some are arrested unofficially, punishment is carried
out extra-judicially in one hour with no appeal, and they are issued the death
sentence. There are some people on death row for which Arafat has to sign off, and in
some cases its outright murder and is tolerated by the authorities with no punishment.
This is problematic because some parts of the Fatah can act with impunity.
Executions often take place immediately after sentencing and are carried out by firing
squad. The European Union, Human Rights Watch, and Palestinian human rights groups
have protested such executions, claiming that those convicted haven't been afforded
fair trials. Freedom House's survey provides several examples of human rights
violations:
In August [2002], four Palestinians were sentenced to death for allegedly helping
Israeli agents kill Palestinian militia members. The verdicts were passed after a
ten-minute hearing. In the same month, a suspected collaborator, Suleiman Abu Amra,
died during interrogation in a Gaza jail.
His body reportedly revealed evidence of torture. According to the
Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group, alleged collaborators are routinely
tortured in Palestinian jails and are denied the right to defend themselves in court.
This practice is not prohibited under Palestinian law.
Amnesty International and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights informed the Public
Committee Against Torture in Israel that six men had been sentenced to death by a
firing squad in April 2002 by the State Security Court. This was after having been
convinced of collaboration with the Israeli General Security Services according to
Amnesty International's April 10, 2002, report on the PA. Himelfarb said:
Those who are convicted have either been caught helping Israelis, spoken out
against Arafat, or are involved in rival criminal gangs, and these individuals are
hung after summary trials. Arafat creates an environment where the violence continues
while silencing would-be critics, and although he could make the violence impossible,
he doesn't stop it.
In a letter written on January 2001 Human Rights Watch called on Arafat to immediately
suspend all executions and retry those individuals with pending death sentences before
courts that meet international fair trial standards. The letter added that Human
Rights Watch was disturbed by the PA's repeated recourse to the death penalty in cases
in which defendants received grossly unfair trials before state security and military
courts whose verdicts may have been influenced by political considerations. Hanny
Megally, executive director of the Middle East and North Africa division of Human
Rights Watch, writes:
These proceedings had little to do with justice. These men were executed after
trials lasting only a few hours, where they had no legal counsel or right to appeal.
The Palestinian Authority has failed to establish the rule of law, and these
suspicious deaths are the product of that failure.
People responsible for wrongful deaths should be brought to justice.
Consequences
The suffering of those Palestinian civilians who are arbitrarily detained, jailed, or
even murdered by the PA spreads within the community. There are severe economic
consequences when a detainee is the family's sole financial provider. Those alleged
collaborators who are murdered are even denied burial in Muslim cemeteries. Social
ostracism is also a reality for most alleged collaborators and their families. It's
usually irrelevant if the alleged collaborator is really guilty or obviously innocent,
since the Palestinian society as a whole readily believes the stories conveyed by the
PA. This is exceptionally problematic since at least 60 percent of the alleged
collaborators killed during the first intifada were innocent.
The actions of the PA indicate that rights for Palestinians aren't regarded as innate.
If Palestinians are to experience those rights considered fundamental to every human
being, pressure will need to be initiated by the outside world.
Erika Waak is an editor for the Humanist.
COPYRIGHT 2003 American Humanist Association in association with The Gale Group and
LookSmart.
COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group
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