The Israeli Operation Defensive Shield began on 29 March 2002 with the reoccupation of the city of Ramallah followed soon after by the rest of the Palestinian cities. The reoccupation lasted variable lengths of time, with the longest in Bethlehem lasting 45 consecutive days.
For Palestinian children, this meant the interruption of normal life, including education, social interactions, accessibility to health care and loss of income for their families. In addition, there was psychological trauma from exposure to shelling, shootings and beatings that led to injuries, disabilities and loss of life.
This report summarizes some specific violations of children's rights that occurred between 29 March and 31 May 2002 as the result of Operation Defensive Shield - the rights to life, physical and psychological well being, healthcare, education and protection from torture.
This report focuses on children under the age of 18. Information was obtained from local and international organizations that deal with children - Defence of Children International (DCI) - Palestinian Sector; National Plan of Action (NPA); UNICEF, the Red Crescent Society (RCS); and Human Development and Information project (HDIP). In addition, the local papers and the Internet were screened for reports on events affecting Palestinian children during that period.
During the reported time period, 55 children were killed. Thirty-eight per cent (21) were under 12 years of age and 85 per cent (47) were males. Forty-four per cent (24) died from live bullets, including rubber-coated metal bullets, 13 per cent (seven) from shelling, bombing or explosions; 9 per cent (five) from delays in receiving healthcare, 19 per cent (10) from acts of violence such as beatings or being struck by army vehicles and 11 per cent (six) were buried under the rubble by a bulldozer. Of those who died, 34.5 per cent were from Nablus and 25.5 per cent from Jenin, 14.5 per cent and 12.7 per cent were from Bethlehem and Hebron respectively.
The data on injury is by no mean complete. This is because there were fewer precise records kept for injury data as death was common and not all the injuries were reported. Overall, 342 injuries were reported. Forty per cent were from Nablus, 33.6 per cent from Hebron and 13 per cent were from Tulkarim. The rest were from the other cities. Of these injuries, live bullets, including rubber-coated metal bullets, caused 24 per cent; beatings, collisions with army vehicles and shock injury caused 51 per cent; the rest were due to other causes. Forty-seven per cent of the children were from the city while the rest were split equally between villages and refugee camps. Again, as in death, 37 per cent were under 12 years of age and most of the injured were males (82.5 per cent).
The DCI - Palestine Sector documented some stories of the injured children.(4)
On 7 June, the Israeli minister of prisoner affairs announced
that 7,500 prisoners were detained in 12 prisons (two of which
had recently been opened); 170 were children and 20 female.(6)
Family visits have been made difficult and if allowed, the mothers
are humiliated through requests such as removing their clothes
in order to be searched.
Since the beginning of the al-Aqsa intifadah in September 2000, Palestinian children have been exposed to harassment, displacement, shooting and destruction of their homes and schools. These measures were drastically increased during the recent occupation, accentuating the psychological effects on children.
Prior to the incursion, and seven to eight months after the intifadah began (April-May 2001), the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) began to document the shooting, bombing and harassment of children.(7) The results showed that, even at that time, 2,7331 (1.3 per cent) of the Palestinians in the West Bank had changed their residence due to the situation - 22.3 per cent permanently and 54 per cent temporarily. Of 483,460 school children interviewed at that time, 3 per cent had been stopped at checkpoints, 1.2 per cent shot at, 1.4 per cent humiliated, 0.8 per cent beaten and an equal number harassed.
At least half of the school children showed psychological symptoms such as crying and fear from loneliness, darkness and loud noises. About a third showed symptoms of sleep disorder, nervousness, decrease in eating and weight, feelings of hopelessness and frustration, and abnormal thoughts of death. About half of the children showed deterioration in their schoolwork and one-third were unable to concentrate. In the same report, around 7 per cent of families had experienced shooting at their houses, 3.5 per cent raids into their homes by Israeli soldiers or settlers and 6 per cent were exposed to tear gas. Five per cent of families reported damage to their land, 3 per cent to their homes and 4 per cent to their cars.
Recently, towards the end of the recent incursion (May 2002), a brief statistical report on the daily life, health and environmental conditions of families living under curfew was prepared by the Institute of Community and Public Health, Birzeit University.(8) The report sampled five cities and showed that 23 to 37 per cent of families housed other families because of life-threatening danger, houses being demolished or taken over by the army, or being stranded and not able to reach their homes. Some 31 to 87 per cent of witnesses reported considerable destruction to their neighbourhoods and 28 to 59 per cent reported exposure to shooting and/or destruction of their own home.
The Israeli occupation forces searched between 30 and 50 per cent of homes; 12 to 36 per cent of households reported the arrest of at least one family member. As a result, between 70 and 93 per cent of interviewees reported mental health problems in at least one family member. Symptoms included great fear among children - shivering, crying, loss of appetite and lack of sleep. Methods for coping included prayer, sleeping with the children, intensification of normal activities, explaining to the children what is happening and sometimes seeking help from a counsellor by telephone.
Now, after the third incursion (June 2002), psychologists expect all the children to have been traumatized, as shooting, damage to properties, bombing and house demolition have become regular events in all Palestinian areas.
Examples of events causing psychological trauma to children include the main incursion into the Jenin refugee camp, which left 600 houses completely destroyed by bombs and bulldozers and 200 houses unfit for habitation, leaving 1,250 families homeless. One personal tale began on 5 April. The Abu Ramaileh family had hidden in the kitchen for a couple of days to avoid shelling and shooting at the camp. At a quiet moment, the father decided to check damage in the sitting room. A shot was heard and when the mother went to check on her husband, she found that he had been shot. The ambulance could not reach the house for seven days and she convinced her children, Muhammed, 7, Hazar, 6, and Rami, 4, that their father was tired and asleep.(9)
In Nablus, 250 houses were destroyed, the families housed in schools, mosques and temporary apartments before their houses were repaired or a permanent residence was available.(10)
Child health in general is dependent on preventive and curative services. In the Palestinian territories, these services are provided free of charge during the first three years of life. After this age, curative services are covered by private or government insurance policies or direct payment for the service.
The PCBS studied health-seeking behaviour for curative services on the West Bank during April and May 2001. Results showed that 28.6 per cent of families who needed curative services did not obtain medical advice because medication was not available, 32.9 per cent said they had no money, 26.6 per cent could not reach a health centre and 16.8 per cent reported that the doctor could not reach the health centre.(11) A month prior to the study, March 2001, the PCBS found 10.7 per cent of households in the Palestinian territories(12) had lost their income and 64.2 per cent were living below the poverty line. Since then, poverty and inaccessibility of drugs and health care has become increasingly worse, especially after the 29 March 2002 reoccupation that led to tighter curfews imposed on Palestinian cities.
Although health-seeking behaviour during the siege has not yet been evaluated, it must have been completely dependent on physical barriers and cash availability. While drug donations and foreign doctors meant that services were available for free in some cities, there is no information on the percentage they covered and the quality of the service they offered.
Looking at income and cash availability, the PCBS in JanuaryFebruary 2002(13) found 57.8 per cent of households in the West Bank lived below the poverty line, while 58 per cent lost half their income during the intifadah - from 2,500 to 1,200 Israeli shekels per month - and a further 20.3 per cent lost their income altogether. Another report, Life and health during the Israeli invasion of the West Bank, prepared by the Institute of Community and Public Health, Birzeit University,(14) reported on the daily life, health and environmental conditions of families living under curfew. In Bethlehem, 65 per cent reported problems with cash availability, compared to 54 per cent in Ramallah, 39 per cent in Tulkarim, 34 per cent in Jenin and 33 per cent in Nablus. Also, 23 to 29 per cent of respondents were no longer working after the reoccupation. This tight situation must have forced families to use alternative methods to protect their health, possibly using indigenous medical practices, traditional healers, over-the-counter drugs and free services offered by physicians.
Preventive services were also interrupted. Some services were remedied when the curfew was lifted, but two could not be remedied: Hepatitis B vaccination, which can lead to chronic Hepatitis and liver cancer; and phenylketonuria (PKU) test, which screens for two diseases, where timing of diagnosis and treatment is crucial to prevent mental retardation in children.
Hepatitis B is normally given to infants in three doses at birth, one and six months to protect children from Hepatitis B, which is moderately endemic (3.4%), according to the Ministry of Health. The Ministry of Health policy is to vaccinate new-borns immediately after birth if the mother is a carrier, to reduce the risk of acquiring the disease. This policy, in optimal circumstances, is 93 per cent effective. However, 7 per cent of infants of infected mothers will acquire Hepatitis B even if vaccinated immediately after birth. Vaccination for Hepatitis B is normally done in the hospital or delivery unit where 93 per cent of Palestinian mothers deliver, while the home-delivery births attend the Mother and Child Health (MCH) Clinic. During the incursion, home deliveries increased to 40 per cent(15) and the MCH clinics became inaccessible for variable lengths of time. As a result, it is predicted that there will be a rise in Hepatitis B among new-borns of infected mothers. Since routine testing is not practised, these children will be discovered when they become chronic carriers as adults.
For PKU, the screening test is done within seven days of birth, when breast-feeding is established, to detect two diseases, phenylketonuria and hypothyroidism. Both are congenital diseases that cause mental retardation, and treatment success depends on the introduction of special milk or hormone replacement as early as possible. Owing to the increase in home deliveries and the inaccessibility of the MCH clinics to mothers and the inaccessibility of the central government laboratory to the MCH clinics, infants were either not tested, tested but the test was not sent to the laboratory or tested at the laboratory but not reported back to the parents. A private physician who opened his clinic when the curfew was lifted temporarily, reported one baby girl who, at 40 days, showed symptoms of developmental delay. Her blood had been tested before the incursion, but the test never reached the laboratory.
The November 2001 PCBS report,(16) which covered only the first year of the uprising and siege, reported that, of those children attending schools, 14 per cent said their schools were closed, bombed, had became a military base or had been entered by Israeli occupation forces; 36 per cent said their time at school had been reduced due to the Israeli measures; 60 per cent had been absent for at least one day due to these measures, with an average of 10 absent days; and 2.4 per cent had had to change their schools.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Education,(17) the initial assessment of damage to schools during the main incursion (from 29 March to 11 April) indicated that some schools were completely destroyed, nine were vandalized, 15 were used as military installations and 15 were used as detention/holding facilities. The systematic destruction and abuse of Palestinian educational facilities resulted not only in material damage and financial loss, but seriously affected the education of hundred of thousands of Palestinian children. The ministry estimates that 54,730 teaching sessions were lost in three weeks as a result of the Israeli siege and the ensuing complete cessation of classes in Ramallah, Nablus, Jenin, Tulkarim, Bethlehem, Qalqilia, Salfit and Qabatia district schools. Moreover, the widespread destruction or confiscation of vital ministry files, such as documents necessary for certifying students' transcripts, will make rebuilding the education sector extremely difficult.
Another problem was the secondary school matriculation examination (tawjihi). Every district has been affected to a certain extent by Israeli curfews and closures. For example, villages to the west of Ramallah have not been able to hold classes for more than two months due to the complete closure placed on that area. Education officials are concerned about how to conduct the nationwide tawjihi examinations when each school has reached a different stage in the curriculum. The examination, taken during the month of June, has been completely disrupted. All Palestinian cities have been reoccupied and are under curfew: Jenin, Beitunia, Tulkarim and Bethlehem since 19 June; Nablus since 21 June; Qalqilia since 22 June; Ramallah since 24 June; and Hebron, Tubas and Arrabeh village since 25 June. This has drastic results on the students as they are expected to apply for universities very soon with their tawjihi grades, otherwise they would miss the deadline for application. It seems most likely that many will lose this year completely as some are injured, in detention, prison or under curfew, or unable to reach the examination site because of closure.
UNICEF estimates that more than 600,000 (61 per cent) of 986,000 children in the West Bank and Gaza Strip were unable to attend school on a regular basis.(18) The percentage in the West Bank, where most of the closures took place, will be much higher, probably approaching 90 per cent.
Reports show that a number of children are leaving private schools to attend government or United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) schools, where education is not of the same high standards. It is also known that child labour is influenced by the adult unemployment rate, so one expects more children to leave school in the next academic year to find regular or irregular paid employment to supplement family income. The rate for 10 to 14 year olds employed prior to the incursion was 0.6 per cent for the West Bank.(19) It will be tragic if this rate increases in the coming years.
A report in the 16 June 2002 issue of Al-Quds newspaper estimates poverty in the West Bank and Gaza Strip had reached 75 per cent.(20) The PCBS reported that the 2002 first-quarter status of the labour force,(21) just before the 29 March Israeli incursion, showed that 59.6 per cent of those on the West Bank aged 15 years and older were outside the labour force by International Labour Organization (ILO) standards. Of those who are employed, 84.4 per cent are working in the Palestinian territories. The percentage of employees whose monthly wages are below the poverty line (1,642 Israeli shekels for a family of two adults and four children), increased from 43.5 per cent in the third quarter of 2000 to 54.2 per cent in the first quarter of 2002. The economic dependency ratio (number of population divided by number of employed person), increased from 4.3 in the third quarter of 2000 to 5.6 in the first quarter of 2002 in the West Bank.
Since the incursion, the Institute of Community and Public Health report, Life and health during the Israeli invasion of the West Bank,(22) revealed that, of those who were working prior to the incursion, between 23 and 29 per cent were no longer working. The main reasons given were the siege and collapse of the market.
As a result of Israeli Operation Determined Path, which began on 26 June 2002, Palestinians living in the West Bank have entered a semi-continuous occupation that is expected to last for an unlimited period of time, poverty affecting families and children is expected to rise to drastic levels as the self-employed and wage employed, making up 87.6 per cent of total employment,(23) is not expected to be sustainable in the absence of aid money and implementation of persistent curfews.
This is expected to affect children by compromising their food intake, as confirmed by the findings of the PCBS,(24) JanuaryFebruary 2002 report on changes to nutrition during the intifadah. It reported that 51 per cent of households reduced the quantity of their food and 63.2 per cent reduced the quality. Monthly-consumed meat was reduced by 73.9 per cent, fruit by 71.3 per cent, and milk and milk products by 54.6 per cent. Sixty-seven per cent of families said price was a very important determinant for purchasing food. This decreased food intake will lead to increased numbers of children failing to thrive and with nutritional inadequacies leading to such diseases as iron deficiency anaemia.
The Palestinian juvenile rehabilitation home in Ramallah,(25) Dar al-Amal, founded in 1958, used as a prison for juveniles during the Israeli occupation, and a rehabilitation home for troubled juveniles since the arrival of the Palestinian National Authority, was completely destroyed during the Israeli invasion. Dar al-Amal served as a support centre, providing classes and counselling for youths, and training for teachers. Just prior to the invasion of Ramallah, 10 of the 15 youths who were housed in the building moved to stay with relatives. The five other children, aged between 12 and 15 years, were not able to find people to stay with and remained in the building along with five teachers.
The building was attacked three times during the invasion.
The director, Anwar Hamam, told DCI - Palestine Sector, who were
reporting this case, that Israeli soldiers raided the building
on 18 April at 5:00 p.m. and placed the teachers and juveniles
in one room on the first floor. On the ground floor they placed
a large number of explosive devices that they detonated from afar.
All of the rooms on the ground floor were completely destroyed.
On the first floor, the bedrooms and bathrooms were destroyed
and looted. Every window and door in the building was smashed
or destroyed with explosive devices while the 10 residents remained
imprisoned in one room. The electricity, water and sewage networks
were completely destroyed during the attacks. Dar al-Amal was
the only institution of its kind operating in Ramallah and one
of only three such centres in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
One of the most serious psychological consequences of these attacks
is that the children who had remained in the building were forced
to return to relatives who were not willing to take them prior
to the 29 March incursion.
The outlook for Palestinian children under Israeli occupation is grim as children's rights continue to be violated and there is no hope in the near future for a political solution. For children who are old enough to remember the time when they were able to travel from one city to another without hassle, attend school without fear of shelling and travel without facing a checkpoint, they understand that their life has changed.
Now, all Palestinians are confined to their homes for variable lengths of time and the sounds of bullets, bombs, tanks and bulldozers are regular background noise. The children sense the adults' desperation and anxiety and become anxious themselves. The ones who are old enough to dream of something else are also old enough to realize that their dreams are a far-fetched fantasy and their reality is poverty, poor education, inadequate health care and fear for their loved ones. The occupation, the tanks, the checkpoints and the Israeli soldiers have incarcerated their dreams. Beyond, there is no future.
1. Al-Quds newspaper, 17 May 2002
2. Al-Quds newspaper, 6 May 2002
3. Defence of Children International (DCI) - Palestine Sector, Situation of Palestinian Children Remains Dire: Killings, Injury, and Arrests of Children Continue. 24 April 2002. ref: 0013/02.
4. DCI - Palestine Sector, Violations of Palestinian Children's Rights: 29 March-19 April 2002. Submitted on 19 April 2002 to Mrs Mary Robinson, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
5. Al-Quds newspaper, 22 May 2002
6. Al-Quds newspaper, 7 June 2002
7. PCBS 2001, Impact of the Israeli Measures: Survey on the Well Being of the Palestinian Children, Women and Palestinian Households, 2001, Main Findings. Ramallah, Palestine.
8. Giacaman R and A. Husseini. Life and Health during the Israeli Invasion of the West Bank. May 2002.
9. Al-Quds newspaper, 24 April 2002
10. Al-Quds newspaper, 20 May 2002
11. PCBS 2002, Impact of the Israeli Measures: Survey on the Well Being of the Palestinian Children, Women and Palestinian Households, 2001, Main Findings. Ramallah, Palestine.
12. PCBS 2001. Impact of the Israeli Measures on the Economic Conditions of Palestinian Households on the Eve of the Israeli Incursion (4th round January-February 2002).
13. PCBS 2002. Impact of the Israeli Measures on the Economic Conditions of Palestinian Households on the Eve of the Israeli Incursion (4th round: January-February 2002).
14. Giacaman R and A. Husseini. Life and Health during the Israeli Invasion of the West Bank. May 2002.
15. Interview with Dr As'ad Ramlawi, deputy general director of primary health care. May 2002.
16. PCBS 2001. Impact of the Israeli Measures: Survey on the Well Being of the Palestinian Children, Women and Palestinian Households, 2001, Main Findings. Ramallah, Palestine.
17. DCI - Palestine Sector, Situation of Palestinian Children Remains Dire: Killings, Injury, and Arrests of Children Continue. 24 April 2002. ref: 0013/02.
18. UNICEF Status Report 2002.
19. PCBS 2002. Palestinian Labour Force Status on the Eve of the Israeli Incursion: JanuaryMarch, 2002.
20. Al-Quds newspaper, 16 June 2002
21. PCBS 2002. Palestinian Labour Force Status on the Eve of the Israeli Incursion: JanuaryMarch, 2002.
22. Giacaman R and A. Husseini. Life and Health during the Israeli Invasion of the West Bank. May 2002.
23. PCBS 2002. Palestinian Labour Force Status on the Eve of the Israeli Incursion: JanuaryMarch, 2002.
24. PCBS 2002. Impact of the Israeli Measures on the Economic Conditions of Palestinian Households on the Eve of the Israeli Incursion (4th round: JanuaryFebruary 2002)
25. DCI - Palestine Sector, Situation of Palestinian Children Remains Dire: Killings, Injury and Arrests of Children Continue. 24 April 2002. ref: 0013/02.
*Institute of Community and Public Health, Birzeit University