Rami*, 17, spent more than a year in Israeli military detention, including 30 days of solitary confinement for interrogation purposes, during which he attempted suicide, according to documentation collected by Defense for Children International - Palestine. Rami was released from Israeli prison as a part of the truce agreement between Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups on November 25.

Israeli forces have killed 3,457 Palestinian children in Gaza, representing more than 40 percent of the total death toll, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza, in three weeks since the Israeli military unleashed a massive military offensive on the Gaza Strip on October 7.

Ramallah, October 24, 2023—More than 300 Palestinian children were killed by Israeli bombardment in Gaza in just the last 24 hours, according to the Ministry of Health. At least 305 Palestinian children were killed in the last 24 hours of Israeli bombardment, marking the deadliest 24 hours in Gaza since Israel launched a large-scale military operation dubbed Operation Iron Swords on October 7.

Ramallah, October 9, 2023—At least 91 Palestinian children have been killed in the Gaza Strip as the Israeli military launched an offensive over the weekend, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health. DCIP has confirmed the killing of at least 50 Palestinian children in direct Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip between October 7 and 9. DCIP continues to document and confirm Palestinian child fatalities in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip as hostilities continue as Israeli forces unleashed a massive military offensive on the Gaza Strip on Saturday after Palestinian armed groups fired rockets toward Israel and breached the Israeli perimeter fence surrounding Gaza early on October 7, launching attacks inside Israel. Israeli forces initiated a large-scale military operation dubbed 'Operation Iron Swords.' “Israeli forces routinely use explosive weapons in densely populated civilian areas with complete disregard for the indiscriminate effects,” said Ayed Abu Eqtaish, accountability program director at DCIP. “Right now, Israeli forces are killing Palestinian children at an unprecedented rate over the past 48 hours as Israeli forces and warplanes target Palestinian armed group leaders taking no precautionary measures and seemingly intending to disproportionately kill and injure civilians and destroy civilian objects. There is no safe space in the Gaza Strip for Palestinian children and their families and they increasingly bear the brunt of Israel’s repeated military offensives.”

A 15-year-old Palestinian needed to get a prosthetic eye after Israeli Border Police shot him at close range. As with a similar recent instance, in which a peddler was shot in the face, the official response was: 'The Border Police knows nothing of this incident'.

One night in 2005, Israeli soldiers came for Huda Dahbour’s teenage son. He was gone for a year and a half. The damage done to their family – and so many others like them – was incalculable.
PS This is an edited extract from « A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: A Palestine Story », publ. by Allen Lane on 3 Oct and available at guardianbookshop.com.

Almost 400 sick children from Gaza were deprived the chance to leave the besieged enclave for the West Bank in six months, according to Save the Children.

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) strongly condemns the Israeli Occupation Forces’ (IOF) use of excessive force that killed a Palestinian child 2 days ago in Hebron, south of the West Bank, after IOF opened fire at him despite posing no danger or threat to Israeli soldiers’ lives. According to information collected by PCHR’s fieldworker and eyewitnesses’ testimonies, at around 20:25 on Saturday, 09 September 2023, one of the Israeli soldiers stationed at a military watchtower established at the northwestern entrance to Al-‘Arroub refugee camp, north of Hebron, opened fire at 3 children who were behind cement cubes, 20 meters away from where the soldiers were stationed.

Every day, settlers violently attack Palestinians, including children, with impunity. This will continue unless the international community acts now.

Over 10 years ago, UNICEF described the interrogation of children held in Israeli military detention as follows: "The children are questioned by men dressed in civilian clothes or military uniforms, or sometimes in Israeli police uniforms. No child has been accompanied by a lawyer or family member during the interrogation [...] The children are rarely informed of their rights, particularly the right against self-incrimination [...] The interrogation mixes intimidation, threats and physical violence, with the clear purpose of forcing the child to confess...

A report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) published on Monday has revealed a spike in Israeli killing of Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank. “The Israeli military and border police forces are killing Palestinian children with virtually no recourse for accountability,” the report read, adding that, although 2022 was “the deadliest year for Palestinian children in the West Bank in 15 years,” 2023 is “on track to meet or exceed 2022 levels”. As of August 22, at least 34 Palestinian children were killed in the occupied West Bank, according to the HRW report.

Israeli settler colonialism and apartheid is based on the extermination of the indigenous population and the elimination of their hope of living freely. Palestinian children represent that hope.

Each year approximately 500-700 Palestinian children, some as young as 12 years old, are detained and prosecuted in the Israeli military court system. The most common charge is stone throwing. A key component of DCI-Palestine’s work is to provide legal assistance to children detained in the Israeli military detention system and to compile accurate statistics on the number of children detained at any one time. The table below shows the number of Palestinian children held in Israeli prisons and detention centers at the end of each month. The table is updated monthly, but the data only provides a snapshot. The figures are compiled by DCI-Palestine from sources including the Israeli Prison Service (IPS) and Israeli army temporary detention facilities.

The school, which is already threatened with demolition by the Israeli occupation authorities, is located in a Bedouin community in the lands of the villages of Kafr Malik, Khirbet Abu Falah, and Al-Mughayer, east of Ramallah.

Some of the abuses are sexual in nature, in addition to being beaten, handcuffed and blindfolded, a report says. The study said 86 percent of the 228 former child detainees surveyed were beaten in detention, and 69 percent were strip-searched, adding that 42 percent were injured at the point of arrest, including gunshot wounds and broken bones. They were also interrogated at unknown locations without the presence of a guardian or caregiver and are often deprived of food, water and sleep, the report says.

Ramallah, 10 July – Palestinian children in the Israel military detention system face physical and emotional abuse, with four out of five (86%) of them being beaten, and 69% strip-searched, according to new research by Save the Children. Nearly half (42%) are injured at the point of arrest, including gunshot wounds and broken bones. Some report violence of a sexual nature and some are transferred to court or between detention centres in small cages, the child rights organisation said.

In strijd met zijn beloften heeft Israël de afgelopen tien jaar geen verbetering gebracht in de behandeling van Palestijnse kinderen in militaire detentie. Fysieke en psychische mishandeling zijn de norm. wat blijkt uit recente rapportages van de organisaties 'Military Court Watch' en 'Defence for Children International – Palestine,' en uit het jaarlijkse voortgangsrapport van de VN over kinderen en gewapend conflict. Ze wijzen uit dat Palestijnse kinderen tot de voornaamste slachtoffers van het Israëlisch-Palestijnse ‘conflict’ behoren – en dat Israëlische beloften om daaraan een einde te maken niets waard zijn gebleken.

Under the bill by MK Yitzhak Kroizer of Otzma Yehudit, minors under the age of 14 will be eligible for prison sentences if convicted of homicide or attempted homicide in the course of a terrorist act.

Israeli authorities' systematic denial of fair trial rights to Palestinian children detained by Israeli forces from the occupied West Bank and prosecuted in Israeli military courts constitutes arbitrary detention, Defense for Children International - Palestine said in a report released today.

Co-sponsored by far-right lawmaker Simcha Rothman, the bill would ban funding for East Jerusalem schools teaching the official Palestinian curriculum, arguing that it includes ‘incitement to terrorism’.

The residents of Jib al-Dib lost their years-long fight to save their elementary school, leaving dozens of children without proper access to education.

Every day, settlers violently attack Palestinians, including children, with impunity. This will continue unless the international community acts now.

On Thursday, Israeli soldiers invaded a Palestinian school in the southern area of Hebron city, in the southern part of the occupied West Bank, before attacking and injuring many schoolchildren and teachers..

Hundreds of Palestinian schools strike in protest at Israeli efforts to impose censored Palestinian textbooks.

Israeli Minister of Education Yifat Shasha-Biton revoked on July 28 the permanent operating licenses of six Palestinian schools in East Jerusalem, under the pretext that their curricula contain “dangerous incitement” against the Israeli government and army. The six schools will be granted a conditional one-year license to amend their curriculum or lose their license entirely.

Heads of Mission of the European Union and likeminded countries together with the Ministry of Education visited Ein Samiya community near Ramallah in light of the imminent threat of demolition of a donor-funded school, which currently provides access to education for 17 children in Ein Samiya and neighbouring herder communities.

First we were ashamed, then we were shocked, and we even investigated. Then we denied it and lied. After that we ignored and repressed it, yawned and lost interest. Now is the worst phase of all: We’ve started to extol the killers of children. That’s how far we’ve gone.