From the Jerusalem Post:
Following a verdict given at the Jerusalem district court, a total sum of 12.7 million NIS was transferred to the offices of foreclosure in Jerusalem after several files were opened against the Palestinian Authority for incarcerating citizens accused of collaborating with Israel.This story shows much of what is wrong in both Israeli and Arab media.
The ones who will benefit the most from these files are the Arab-Israeli citizens living in the West Bank, who were falsely imprisoned by the Palestinian Authority under the suspicion of helping Israel.
According to the verdict given by judge Moshe Drori, the arrest and imprisonment were done without authority, as the PA was never given such power beyond the West Bank. The Imprisonment itself provided enough grounds to sue for damages.
Judge Drori described in his decision the various atrocities done at the basements of the PA's security facilities, which included torture, rape, amputations and even murder.
The Law Enforcement and Collection System Authority will work in the following days to distribute the money to the people involved in accordance with the court's decision.
When were Israeli citizens arrested and imprisoned by the PA? Where was the coverage?
Was this downplayed because they were Arabs and not Jews? If so, this is unacceptable.
I found some details in this story from two years ago, in what appears to be the same case:
52 Palestinian collaborators, or those suspected of collaborating with Israel, have received recognition for the first time from an Israeli court that the Palestinian Authority had in fact arrested and tortured them for years. In the over 1,800-page judicial ruling, Jerusalem District Court Vice President Justice Moshe Drori wrote that beyond a reasonable doubt, systematic arrests took place between 1990-2003, during which dozens of Palestinians suffered severe abuse, that left them with physical and mental disabilities.This story doesn't mention that they were Arab Israelis.
“Throughout the day you’re tied to the wall, at night, they take you to interrogations,” one of the collaborators claimed. “From the moment you enter the room, you don’t see the interrogator since they place a sac over your head that was probably in the sewer for ten years. You don’t see who is hitting you…They say, ‘You worked with the Israeli Shin Bet, you have to admit it, period.'”
Attorney Barak Kedem, who represents the plaintiffs stated, “It’s as if someone read Dante’s Inferno and asked to imitate it.” The three plaintiffs said that at no point were they presented with any evidence or witness testimony, rather, only with the demand for a confession.
Some of the torture also included sadistic harm to the detainees’ genitals. Many reported similar methods of horrific sexual abuse that left them infertile and unable to have sex. “There’s some contraption there called ‘the bottle fixer,'” said one of the plaintiffs. “It’s a 1.5-liter bottle of Coca-Cola with a broken top placed inside a block of concrete, and you sit on top. They take care that your life is over. They finish you, ensure you won’t have kids.”
After the court’s ruling this week, which also recognized cases of extrajudicial executions carried out by the Palestinian Authority, the plaintiffs and their next of kin intend to move on to the next stage in their lawsuit: compensation claims worth millions of NIS, each, in the hope that Israel will confiscate the funds from the Palestinian Authority.
Where did they live? Did they move into areas under Palestinian Authority control to be with relatives? Or were they "settlers" who were arrested when visiting PA-controlled areas? (Israeli Arabs are allowed to visit PA-controlled areas, Israeli Jews aren't.)
It is great that they are getting compensated, but the paucity of information about Israelis in Palestinian prison shows a deep bias in the media not to report on what should have been a major story.
UPDATE: In 2002, CNN reported that the Palestinians had killed some 1500 "collaborators" between 1987 and 2002. Did you know that?