Israel’s claim to be a democracy is based on many false conceptions. The most obvious falsification is the idea there is a “democratic Israel” existing alongside temporarily occupied territories, the West Bank and Gaza. In actuality Israel is pursuing aggressive ethnic cleansing all along the occupied territories and illegal settlers are the strongest force in Israeli politics. The complementary falsification is the idea that Palestinians in the territory occupied by Israel since 1948 are citizens enjoying full civil rights, even if denied national rights. Whenever those Palestinians, who are formally citizens, organize to protest their discrimination, the state reveals it true dictatorial nature as an occupying power.
One of the most extreme measures of military oppression is administrative detention. Under Israel’s “emergency laws” — and mind you the “emergency” in Israel has lasted for the last 73 years since its establishment — the military authorities can order the detention of any person without indictment for up to six months, renewable for an unlimited number of times. Administration detention is commonly used against Palestinians in the territory Israel has occupied since 1967, but there is also a long history of it being used on Palestinian citizens of Israel as well. These types of laws were used to crush the “al-Ard” movement – the first Palestinian political movement that tried to organize in “48 Palestine” in the fifties and sixties. In 1988, at the height of the first intifada, some 10 leading members of “Abna al-Balad”, a leftist grass-root movement, were placed under administrative detention. Now, with the latest popular uprising in solidarity with Sheikh Jarrah, against the bombardment of Gaza and against the fascists’ attacks on Palestinian residents in the mixed cities, it is being used again. In addition to mass detentions and violent attacks by police and border guards against the population at large, Israel is resorting again to administrative detention of Palestinians who are formally recognized as citizens.
On Friday, June 4, as part of the mass detention campaign in Umm al-Fahm, the police arrested Zafer Jabareen. A day after his detention Jabareen was brought to the court with the rest of the detainees and his detention was remanded for 3 more days on claims that he should be interrogated for taking part in disturbing public order. He was taken to Shabak (the secret security services) detention – but was not really interrogated. On Tuesday, June 8, instead of releasing Jabareen or bringing him to another remand hearing, he was informed that Israel’s war minister, Benny Gantz, signed an administrative detention order for four months against him. The next day he was brought before Judge Ron Shapira, the head of the Haifa district court for the “judicial supervision” over his detention.
Zafer Jabareen, age 44, was arrested in 2002, at the time of the Second intifada, accused of membership in a banned organization and activities against the state. He was sentenced to 17 years in prison. After his release in 2019 he married and was working in construction. His wife is now pregnant with their first child, and will be missing her husband at this critical period.
The “United Fahmawi Herak” and the popular committee of Umm al-Fahm called for a demonstration in front of the Haifa court at the time of the hearing on Wednesday, June 9. About a hundred people gathered in front of the court, including leaders from all the Palestinian political parties, the mayor of Umm al-Fahm Dr. Samir Subhi Mahamid and many youth activists from the Herak. The police also were present with many heavily armed military-style types, and completely sealed off all the area around the court’s entrance. The demonstrators carried placards in Arabic, Hebrew and English in solidarity with Zafer Jabareen, calling for an end to administrative detention and denouncing the detentions campaign against the Palestinian masses.
When Zafer Jabareen’s lawyer, Mahmoud Jabareen, came out of the hearing, he updated the demonstrators and the press about what happened in the hearing. He couldn’t hide his frustration. He tried to ask questions about the accusations or suspicions against Zafer, but was told that all the materials are secret and no answers will be given. He told the court there is nothing he can do to defend his client without knowing why he was detained. He was not even allowed to be present in the courtroom when the Shabak presented “secret evidence” to the judge.
I talked with the lawyer later and he explained that the administrative detention is based on an old “emergency law” and is not subject to the newer law governing criminal detention. In the criminal detention law, the judge is obliged to consider the detainees human rights and, if he finds that there is a legal basis for detention, he still should consider whether there are other ways to supervise the detainee without holding him in prison. In the emergency law that governs administrative detention, even as there is no indictment and no way the detainee can defend himself or disprove “secret evidence”, there is also no consideration of the detainee’s human rights and the court is not allowed even to consider other means of supervision.
The police and Shabak love to use the threat of administrative detention as a way to break the spirit of people under interrogation. They can tell the interrogated that, if they don’t confess to any crime, and even if there is no evidence against them, they can still find themselves in prison for an unlimited period. So, better close a plea bargain and you will know at least when you will get out of prison.
Meanwhile, Haaretz, while reporting on Jabareen’s administrative detention, mentioned that there is another administrative detainee from the Nazareth area. This detainee was also detained for interrogation (on May 17th) and later transferred to administrative detention.
On Sunday, June 13, Judge Shapira issued his decision ratifying General Gantz’s administrative detention decree against Zafer Jabareen. Jabareen’s family and friends, and some political activists gathered outside the courtroom’s closed doors and were not surprised to hear the ruling. Some of them repeated the popular saying: “When your judge is your oppressor, to whom do you complain?”
“Long-term effectshttps://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f5/Bogside_%2812%29%2C_August_2009.JPG/220px-Bogside_%2812%29%2C_August_2009.JPG
Modern anti-internment graffiti on Derry’s Walls seen from the Bogside area of Derry. (August 2009)
The backlash against internment contributed to the decision of the British Government under Prime Minister Edward Heath to suspend the Northern Ireland Government and replace it with direct rule from Westminster, under the authority of a British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. This took place on 23 March 1972.[25]
Following the suspension of the Northern Ireland Government and Parliament, internment was continued with some largely cosmetic modifications by the direct rule administration until 5 December 1975. During this time a total of 1,981 people were interned: 1,874 were from an Irish nationalist background, while 107 were from a unionist background.[1]
Historians generally view the period of internment as inflaming sectarian tensions in Northern Ireland, while failing in its goal of arresting key members of the IRA. Senator Maurice Hayes, Catholic Chairman of the Northern Ireland Community Relations Commission at the time, has described internment as ‘possibly the worst of all the stupid things that government could do”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Demetrius#Legal_basis
This is the road the Apartheid regime is heading down.Call it want you want–adminstrative detention-Internment without trial , it is self defeating .Israel is getting more desperate and is resorting to these acts of desperation because it is operating in a unilateral and impulsive way .
Tic Toc Tic Toc.