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Elections for the President of the Palestinian Authority and for the Legislative Council took place in January. Yasser Arafat was overwhelmingly elected President while the Fatah Party won the majority of seats in the Council. The Legislative Council passed a first reading of a Basic Law which declared the Palestinian Authority's respect for un human rights standards, but the executive authority had not completed its consideration of the law by the end of the year. The implementation of the next stage of the 1995 Oslo ii accord which was to involve Israeli withdrawal was delayed after suicide bombings in February and March and the election in May of a new Israeli Government under Binyamin Netanyahu.
The Palestinian Authority's security forces arrested more than 1,200 people on security grounds, including prisoners of conscience and possible prisoners of conscience. Those detained included over 900 people arrested after the suicide bombings in Israel in February and March by Palestinian groups opposed to the peace process with Israel which resulted in 63 deaths (see Israel and the Occupied Territories entry). Detainees were rarely charged with any offence or brought before a judge within the legal limits laid down by Palestinian law. In August, the High Court of Justice in Ramallah ruled that the detention of 10 Birzeit University students, held since March without charge or trial, was illegal. However, the students were not released after the ruling and two remained in detention at the end of the year. The President of the High Court was retired soon after the judgment.
Among the prisoners of conscience arrested during the year were human rights activists. Bassem Eid, a fieldworker for the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem, was detained in Ramallah for 24 hours in January. Dr Iyad al-Sarraj, Commissioner-General of the Palestinian Independent Commission for Citizens' Rights, an independent human rights monitoring body set up by President Arafat in 1993, was detained for making statements critical of the Palestinian Authority. He was held in Gaza Central Prison for eight days in May and rearrested in June and charged with possession of drugs. He was beaten after arrest and, after smuggling out a note concerning the beating, charged with assaulting the police. The drugs charge was rejected by a magistrates' court, but the State Security Court remanded him in custody; he was released after 16 days. Muhammad Dahman, Director of al-Damir (Conscience), a human rights organization, was detained for 15 days in August, charged with incitement by spreading false information after the organization issued a communique suggesting that a detainee had died as a result of torture. Muhammad Dahman appeared before the State Security Court before being released without trial. It remained unclear whether charges against Dr Iyad al-Sarraj and Muhammad Dahman had been dropped.
At least 20 political detainees received unfair trials before the State Security Court. The Court was presided over by military judges; prosecutors and defence lawyers were normally state-appointed lawyers who worked for the security services; trials were often summary; and there was no right of appeal.
Torture of detainees was widespread. Methods of torture included burning with electric elements, beatings, suspension from the ceiling, dropping molten plastic on the body, cigarette burns and sleep deprivation. Three detainees died in custody after torture. In July, Mahmud Jumayel died in Jneid Prison in Nablus. He had been whipped with cables while suspended upside-down, by the naval police (bahriyya). He had been arrested in December 1995 and detained in Jericho before being transferred to Jneid Prison in July. The executive authority and the Legislative Council set up inquiries into his death and made a number of recommendations, including provision for tighter control of the security forces. Three members of the naval police were charged with causing unintentional death and sentenced to up to 15 years' imprisonment after a summary trial before the State Security Court in Jericho. The trial was unfair; defendants had a state-appointed military lawyer who offered no defence, no witnesses were called and no information was given as to who had ordered the torture.
No findings of any of the other inquiries announced by the Palestinian Authority were made public, including the inquiry announced into the death in detention of Azzam Muslah (see Amnesty International Report 1996). Three members of the security services were said to have been sentenced to up to seven years' imprisonment for their part in his death, but no information about their trial was available.
At least 10 people died as a result of possible extrajudicial executions or other unlawful killings by Palestinian Authority security forces during the year. Two Islamic Jihad activists, 'Ayman al-Razayna and 'Amar al-A'raj, were killed in their home in Gaza in February when members of the Palestinian Authority's security forces entered the house. There was no evidence to suggest that they had resisted arrest. An inquiry was ordered into the killings but no report had been made public by the end of the year. Others were killed during a demonstration as a result of the accidental discharge of a weapon and in cross-fire between rival branches of the security forces.
Eleven people were sentenced to death in Gaza on charges of murder. Two death sentences were commuted. Those sentenced to death included three members of the special forces convicted of carrying out a revenge killing in October. They were tried before the State Security Court, reportedly without access to defence lawyers. There were no executions.
Amnesty International delegates met President Arafat and raised the organization's concerns about impunity for the perpetrators of human rights abuses, including torture, and stressed the need to guarantee freedom of association and expression for human rights organizations. President Arafat stated that no one, including the security forces, should be above the law. In a press conference in Oslo in November, President Arafat stated that he was committed to ending torture.
Throughout the year, Amnesty International called for the commutation of death sentences and raised concerns about torture and prolonged political detention without trial. Responses on specific cases of reported torture were received from the authorities and security and local officials.
Amnesty International published a report, Palestinian
Authority: Death in custody of Mahmud Jumayel, in September and in
December it published Palestinian Authority: Prolonged political detention,
torture and unfair trials.
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