Israel is using a notorious military tool to arrest its own Palestinian citizens

Baker Zoubi

January 8, 2024

Administrative detention, long weaponized against Palestinians under occupation, is gradually being directed toward those with citizenship too.

 

In the shadow of the Hamas-led October 7 attack and Israel’s ongoing bombardment of the Gaza Strip, Palestinian citizens of Israel have been facing a wave of persecution. Hundreds have been arrested or interrogated, usually on the basis of social media activity; dozens more have been suspended or dismissed from Israeli academic institutions; and a recent amendment to Israel’s Counterterrorism Law is enabling unprecedented levels of surveillance.

At the same time, a more subtle but equally dangerous move to further cast the community as “internal enemies” has gone largely under the radar: since October 7, Israel has placed seven Palestinian citizens in administrative detention.

Israel has routinely used administrative detention to arbitrarily incarcerate Palestinians in the occupied territories — who are subject to Israeli military rule — for months or even years on the basis of “classified” evidence, without the need for standard legal proceedings like presenting charges or holding a trial. Before the war, there was already a higher number of administrative detainees — over 1,300 — than at any time in the previous three decades; now, that figure has more than doubled.

But this practice has very rarely been used against Palestinians with Israeli citizenship since the lifting of military rule inside the state in 1966. In fact, according to Nareman Shehadeh-Zoabi, a lawyer at the Haifa-based legal center Adalah, there were only four known such cases in recent years: three during the Palestinian uprising of May 2021 that became known as the “Unity Intifada,” and a single case before that.

Earlier this year, Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir raised the prospect of using the measure more widely against Palestinian citizens, ostensibly to crack down on the plague of organized crime and gun violence within Arab communities in Israel. Human rights organizations and civil society groups strongly objected to those proposals at the time, fearing that the Israeli authorities would inevitably expand the use of administrative detention beyond the fight against crime.

While Ben Gvir didn’t initially get his wish, the authorities are now using the measure more than ever against Palestinian citizens, with the current Gaza war providing the justification. In recent weeks, two Palestinians from Umm al-Fahem, one from Qalansawa, three from Arraba and Sakhnin, and one from Majd al-Krum have all been incarcerated using administrative detention.

“It started with three detainees about a month and a half ago, and now we’re talking about seven,” Sawsan Zaher, a human rights attorney representing the three detainees from Arraba and Sakhnin, told +972 and Local Call. “It’s a very worrying escalation.”

Hussein Manna, a lawyer representing another of the detainees, described this as “a new wave of repression against Arab society. Ordinary activities are now suddenly linked to anti-terrorism laws or accusations of incitement to terrorism. Standard arrests have decreased because it is difficult for the police to justify them, so that makes administrative detention a useful tool, because security forces don’t have to present any evidence.”

‘Preventing Arab society from raising its head’

On Dec. 5, Jaber Mahajneh was arrested by the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, in the northern city of Umm al-Fahem. According to his lawyer, Raslan Mahajneh (no immediate relation), he was set to be released after a week in jail. However, Mahajneh then received an order, signed by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, to place him in administrative detention.

“From the materials we were allowed to see, there are no real reasons for this arrest,” the lawyer explained. “He is a religious man who writes religious texts. They said they found texts in his house talking about jihad, although these are ordinary texts from the Qur’an and religious books. Even the judge did not believe that there was serious evidence against the detainee. But because the country is at war, he approved administrative detention on [Jaber] for three months, and said that if the circumstances of the war change, the issue can be reexamined.”

Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) — a Palestinian political party that Israel considers a terrorist group. No evidence was presented to back up this accusation.

 

“They claim there is no suspicion [that he committed a crime], but that it is likely that he intends to, and so not arresting him will harm the state’s security,” Manna, who is Sagir’s attorney, explained. “And of course, under the pretext of war and a state of emergency, the court immediately approved the detention despite our claim that it violates his rights as a citizen — that citizens cannot be arrested and kept in extended detention if they have not broken the law. But this argument was to no avail.”

Israel’s use of administrative detention as a supposedly “preventive” measure is particularly common. “The whole idea of it is illegal — preventive detention without qualifying evidence,” said Adalah’s Shehadeh-Zoabi. She likened it to believing that you could “enter a person’s head, know his intentions, and stop him” before he commits a crime. This, she added, is how Israel acts toward Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, as a way of “criminalizing the enemy.”

Zaher believes that there could be a connection between the current wave of administrative detentions and reports following the May 2021 uprising, including one by the State Comptroller, that Israel’s police had profoundly failed to prepare for and handle the events that unfolded during those weeks. “All the arrests under the pretext of incitement since the beginning of the war, including these administrative detentions, as well as other oppressive measures, aim to prevent Arab society from protesting,” she explained. “Their goal is to not repeat the events of 2021.”

Shehadeh-Zoabi agrees. After the 2021 uprising, she said, the Israeli authorities filed 16 indictments on charges of incitement; since October 7, they have filed over 70. “It is clear that Israel is trying to strike a preemptive blow and prevent Arab society from expressing its opinions, demonstrating, and raising its head. [Israel is] treating its citizens as enemies and putting them in administrative detention without evidence. This is a new era.”

Mahajneh believes this trend is set to continue. “They can now arrest whomever they want without any problem, and in light of the current context, we expect there to be more arrests in the near future.”

 

Israeli airstrike kills journalists – Al Jazeera

RT

The Israel Defense Forces claimed reporter Hamza Dahdouh and a colleague were traveling in the same vehicle as a terrorist

An Israeli airstrike killed two journalists and seriously injured another in southern Gaza on Sunday, Al Jazeera has reported. The outlet said that one of the reporters, Hamza Dahdouh, was the eldest son of its Gaza bureau chief, Wael Dahdouh, who previously lost several other family members in an Israeli attack.

At least 68 media professionals have reportedly died since hostilities between Israel and Hamas erupted on October 7.

The slain reporters had been planning to interview Palestinian civilians displaced by a previous Israeli bombardment, according to Al Jazeera. Along with Dahdouh, Mustafa Thuria, a video stringer for AFP who also worked for the Qatar-based media outlet, lost his life in the airstrike. A third reporter in the vehicle survived the attack, Al Jazeera said.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) warned in December that journalists are being killed in Gaza at an unprecedented rate. The vast majority of the victims were Palestinians, the NGO noted. According to the CPJ, there is an “apparent pattern of [Israel] targeting journalists and their families.” In addition, 20 reporters have been detained by Israeli security forces and another three are missing, it claimed.

Reporters without shame: Top ‘media rights’ organization ignores rampant killings of Gaza journalists READ MORE: Reporters without shame: Top ‘media rights’ organization ignores rampant killings of Gaza journalists

In a statement on Sunday, Al Jazeera called on the International Criminal Court, the UN, and governments and human rights organizations to “hold Israel accountable for its heinous crimes,” also demanding an end “to the targeting and killing of journalists.”

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) claimed to the Times of Israel later on Sunday that the two slain journalists had been traveling in a vehicle with a terrorist who was operating a drone. Last month, the Israeli military insisted its forces have “never, and will never, deliberately target journalists.”

Al Jazeera noted its Gaza bureau chief had already lost his wife, daughter, another son, and a grandson in an Israeli airstrike in late October. Dahdouh himself was wounded in an Israeli attack in December, with his cameraman later succumbing to his injuries.

Months of heavy Israeli aerial bombardment of Gaza and ground operations have left nearly 23,000 Palestinians dead, according to local health officials. The escalation was triggered by the surprise Hamas incursion into Israeli territory on October 7, during which militants killed 1,200 people. Some 240 people were also abducted, with 132 still in captivity.

 

Press Freedom Group Demands Probe Into Israel’s Killing of Reporters in Gaza

Zane McNeill

“Journalists are civilians, not targets,” said one advocate for press freedom.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CJP) has called for an impartial investigation into the Israeli drone strike on Sunday that killed freelance journalist Mustafa Thuraya and Al Jazeera reporter Hamza Al Dahdouh, son of Wael Al Dahdouh, the Gaza bureau chief for Al Jazeera.

Hamza Al Dahdouh is the fifth member of Wael Al Dahdouh’s family to be killed by an Israeli airstrike; on October 25, an airstrike targeting the Nuseirat refugee camp killed Wael Al Dahdouh’s wife, daughter, son, and grandson.

“The killings of journalists Hamza Al Dahdouh and Mustafa Thuraya must be independently investigated, and those behind their deaths must be held accountable. The continuous killings of journalists and their family members by Israeli army fire must end: journalists are civilians, not targets,” Sherif Mansour, CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator, said in a statement on Sunday.

Since October 7, Israeli forces have killed at least 79 journalists and media workers in Gaza and the West Bank. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) found that Israel’s genocidal bombing campaign in Gaza has killed more than one journalist a day since it began, accounting for 72 percent of all journalist deaths worldwide in 2023.

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Relatives and colleagues of Palestinian journalists Saeed Al-Taweel and Mohammad Sobh, who were killed in Israeli airstrikes, mourn in Gaza Strip on October 10, 2023.

“Since 7 October, more than one journalist a day has lost their lives during the war in Gaza, a scale and pace of loss of media professionals’ lives without precedent,” the group said in a press release. “In 2023 Palestinian journalists in the Gaza Strip have been the victims of indiscriminate bombing by the Israeli army. The IFJ calls on international authorities to ensure that international law is respected and to put an end to the massacre of journalists in Gaza.”

In December, a CJP report revealed that the number of journalists killed in the initial ten weeks of Israel’s assault on Gaza surpassed the total number of journalists killed in any single country throughout an entire year.

“The Israel-Gaza war is the most dangerous situation for journalists we have ever seen, and these figures show that clearly,” Mansour said in a statement. “The Israeli army has killed more journalists in 10 weeks than any other army or entity has in any single year. And with every journalist killed, the war becomes harder to document and to understand.”

CJP also found that in addition to Israel’s systematic killing of Palestinian journalists, which is a tactic that has been used by the Israeli military for over 20 years, Israel has begun targeting journalists’ families.

“CPJ is particularly concerned about an apparent pattern of targeting of journalists and their families by the Israeli military,” CJP said in a statement. “In at least one case, a journalist was killed while clearly wearing press insignia in a location where no fighting was taking place. In at least two other cases, journalists reported receiving threats from Israeli officials and IDF [Israeli Defense Forces] officers before their family members were killed.”

Recent investigations by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Reuters and AFP into an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon on October 13 found that the IDF attack was most likely a deliberate assault targeting Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and six other journalists.

“Israel says it does not target journalists. It needs to explain whether it used one of its drones for a precision attack on these two journalists and why it launched strikes on those like Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah, who was clearly wearing press insignia and away from direct fighting,” said Mansour.

Advocacy groups believe that the Israeli Defense Forces are attempting to suppress media coverage of the genocide in Gaza by killing journalists in violation of international law. In November, Reporters Without Borders filed a case with the International Criminal Court, asking it to investigate “war crimes committed against journalists during the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Gaza.”

 

‘Eradication of journalism in Gaza’ continues as Israel kills two more reporters

Jake Johnson

The international community must “hold Israel accountable for its heinous crimes,” said the Al Jazeera Media Network.

An Israeli airstrike in the southern Gaza city of Rafah on Sunday killed two Palestinian journalists and seriously wounded a third, adding to the war’s grisly toll on media workers.

The Al Jazeera Media Network said in a statement that the Israeli military targeted the journalists’ car as they were driving through the northern part of Rafah. The strike killed Hamza Dahdouh, the 27-year-old son of Al Jazeera‘s Gaza bureau chief, and Mustafa Thuraya, a freelance videographer working with Agence France-Presse. Hazem Rajab was injured in the Israeli strike.

“The assassination of Mustafa and Hamza, Al Jazeera correspondent Wael Dahdouh’s son, whilst they were on their way to carry out their duty in the Gaza Strip reaffirms the need to take immediate necessary legal measures against the occupation forces to ensure that there is no impunity,” the network said, imploring the international community to “hold Israel accountable for its heinous crimes.”

Hamza is the fifth member of Wael Dahdouh’s family killed in Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip. Earlier in the war, Israeli strikes killed Dahdouh’s wife, younger son, daughter, and grandson. Wael himself was wounded by an Israeli drone strike that killed Al Jazeera journalist Samer Abu Daqqa.

“Hamza was everything to me, the eldest boy, he was the soul of my soul,” Wael said in anguished remarks from the cemetery where his son was buried. “These are the tears of parting and loss, the tears of humanity.”

Christophe Deloire, secretary-general of Reporters Without Borders, expressed “shock” in response to news of Dahdouh and Thuraya’s killing.

“This unbearable massacre must stop,” Deloire wrote on social media. “Israel must be held accountable for this eradication of journalism in Gaza. We will continue to refer to the International Criminal Court so that maximum priority is given to crimes against journalists. Justice must be served.”

Since October 7, Israeli forces have killed dozens of media workers in the Gaza Strip, where around 1,000 journalists were working before the assault. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), more journalists were killed in the first 10 weeks of the war “than have ever been killed in a single country over an entire year.”

“CPJ is particularly concerned about an apparent pattern of targeting journalists and their families by the Israeli military,” the group said last month. An investigation by Reporters Without Borders concluded that Reuters video journalist Issam Abdallah and his colleagues were deliberately targeted in October 13 strikes in southern Lebanon.

Reporters Without Borders has filed two war crimes complaints with the International Criminal Court since early October. The second complaint, submitted last month, accuses the Israel Defense Forces of intentionally killing seven Palestinian journalists.

“Targeting reporters is a war crime,” the group wrote in a social media post on Sunday.