“Israel” Jails Palestinian Teenager for Three Years

The court on Thursday ruled that 13-year-old Ashraf Adwan from Eizariya town should pay 5,000 “Israeli” shekels [$1461] in fine and compensation, the Palestinian Information Center reported.

Adwan was abducted from outside the al-Aqsa Mosque compound in September last year.

He has been interrogated in harsh circumstances at an “Israeli” detention center over the past few months. The teenager is also said to have been tortured.

Adwan’s mother expressed her sadness at the ruling on Thursday and said the “Israeli” authorities had only allowed her to visit him once after his detention.

“I am longing to see Ashraf and I miss his presence at home because he is my youngest child. His father died when he was a seven-month-old baby. During the last period of his detention, I was able to visit him once,” the mother said.

Back in April, the Palestinian Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission said in a report that nearly 200 Palestinian children were kept behind bars in “Israeli” prisons in inhumane conditions, undergoing “very rough interrogation process and torture.”

Qadri Abu Baker, the head of the commission, denounced the UN at the time for failing to “provide the minimum protection for the Palestinian children” against physical and psychological abuse in “Israeli” jails.

Abu Baker said “Israeli” forces had arrested more than 17,000 minors since 2000, adding that in most cases the children under the age of 10 were detained. He stressed that the majority of the children had been subjected to physical and psychological torture.

According to figures by the Defense for Children International, between 500 and 700 Palestinian children at the age of 12-17 are arrested and tried in “Israeli” military courts every year. 

Detention of Palestinian children by the “Israeli” regime violates Article 33 and Article 34 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, according to which the parties must protect children from abduction and all forms of exploitation.

The “Israeli” entity has a long history in wounding and killing Palestinian children, especially during anti-occupation protests.

In March 2019, UNICEF said about 40 Palestinian children had been killed and hundreds more wounded in a year of anti-occupation protests along the fence that separates the besieged Gaza Strip and the occupied Palestinian territories.

More than 7,000 Palestinians are reportedly held in “Israeli” prisons. Hundreds of inmates have apparently been incarcerated under the practice of administrative detention, a policy under which Palestinians are kept in “Israeli” detention centers without trial or charge.