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PDF FormatDuring the PA’s first year, PICCR issued only two short statements, plus an annual report that summarized problems that had already been publicized by human rights groups and the international media.122 In the report, the organization praised the government on a number of points, noting that PICCR had generally received “unhindered access to persons and documents needed for investigation” and that the PA had been “responsive to its suggestions and recommendations for changes.”123 The report even described the Voice of Palestine, the government’s mouthpiece, as “a positive demonstration of a PNA [Palestinian National Authority] body attempting to exercise freedom of speech.”124
Though PICCR was the only human rights organization that was officially part of the government, Arafat and the PA police sought to induce independent Palestinian rights groups to behave in a similarly “positive spirit.” One means they used was to prevent rights organizations from obtaining information about abuses. The PA refused to furnish data about rights violations, stonewalled in response to questions about specific cases, and banned most organizations from visiting detention facilities under its control in Gaza.125 In the rare cases in which permission was granted, the visiting field worker was accompanied by a prison official, whose presence intimidated any prisoner otherwise inclined to complain.126 Outside the jails, PA police, especially the intelligence units, created a climate of fear that prevented victims from filing complaints. Those brave individuals willing to tell their stories to rights activists generally asked that their names not be used, which made their testimony far less effective.127
The PA also undercut the motivation of rights groups by preventing them from getting their findings out to the Arab residents of the West Bank and Gaza. Beginning in July 1994, PA-run radio and television, the daily papers, and most of the weeklies studiously avoided covering reports about PA abuses. Though several human rights organizations criticized Arafat’s decision to establish the state security courts in February 1995, their statements were not even mentioned in the Palestinian media. As a result of this blackout, activists were compelled to be more cautious out of concern that they lacked the public backing that would be necessary to prevent the PA from cracking down on them.128
With these limitations in place, Arafat was well positioned to persuade the heads of the leading organizations that they should soft-pedal their reporting on PA abuses. Given the predilection of many Palestinian rights activists to favor nationalist aims over the protection of human rights, this message worked effectively. The head of the Mandela Institute for Political Prisoners, an affiliate of al-Haq, was voicing a common view when he explained his group’s stance towards Arafat’s government:
Though PICCR was the only human rights organization that was officially part of the government, Arafat and the PA police sought to induce independent Palestinian rights groups to behave in a similarly “positive spirit.” One means they used was to prevent rights organizations from obtaining information about abuses. The PA refused to furnish data about rights violations, stonewalled in response to questions about specific cases, and banned most organizations from visiting detention facilities under its control in Gaza.125 In the rare cases in which permission was granted, the visiting field worker was accompanied by a prison official, whose presence intimidated any prisoner otherwise inclined to complain.126 Outside the jails, PA police, especially the intelligence units, created a climate of fear that prevented victims from filing complaints. Those brave individuals willing to tell their stories to rights activists generally asked that their names not be used, which made their testimony far less effective.127
The PA also undercut the motivation of rights groups by preventing them from getting their findings out to the Arab residents of the West Bank and Gaza. Beginning in July 1994, PA-run radio and television, the daily papers, and most of the weeklies studiously avoided covering reports about PA abuses. Though several human rights organizations criticized Arafat’s decision to establish the state security courts in February 1995, their statements were not even mentioned in the Palestinian media. As a result of this blackout, activists were compelled to be more cautious out of concern that they lacked the public backing that would be necessary to prevent the PA from cracking down on them.128
With these limitations in place, Arafat was well positioned to persuade the heads of the leading organizations that they should soft-pedal their reporting on PA abuses. Given the predilection of many Palestinian rights activists to favor nationalist aims over the protection of human rights, this message worked effectively. The head of the Mandela Institute for Political Prisoners, an affiliate of al-Haq, was voicing a common view when he explained his group’s stance towards Arafat’s government:
We should get close to the PA and help them learn what it means to respect the rule of law. Human rights shouldn’t be used to undermine PA legitimacy. Our goal should be to end PA violations, not destroy the PA.129
As a result of Arafat’s tactics and the attitudes of many rights activists, the major groups institutionalized heavy self-censorship, and either ceased to document violations, or did not publish those that they found.130
The most important consequence of this strategy was that the two leading Palestinian rights organizations in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem adopted a low profile during the Gaza-Jericho period. The director of al-Haq, Fatah Azzam, decided that quiet contacts, letter-writing to the authorities, and private meetings should be preferred, with going public saved as a last resort.131 His organization occasionally put out releases criticizing particular acts by the PA, but nothing comparable in frequency or scope to the hard-hitting reports that had marked its treatment of Israeli abuses.132 The Palestinian Human Rights Information Center, a subsidiary of the Arab Studies Society based in the Orient House, in eastern Jerusalem, issued its last public criticisms of the PA in August 1994.133 The longtime director of PHRIC, Jan Abu Shakra, resigned in October of that year, apparently because the Arab Studies Society threatened to cut off funding if the group publicly attacked PA abuses.134 Subsequently, PHRIC cut back on activity and issued statements only to castigate Israel or defend the PA.135
Nonetheless, Arafat was not successful in taming all the Palestinian human rights activists, and a small group of courageous and principled individuals continued to criticize the PA’s practices from the inauguration of the Palestinian government and on through election day. The most prominent of these were Raji a-Sourani, a lawyer who had headed the prestigious Gaza Center for Rights and Law beginning in 1990; Bassem Eid, a Palestinian from eastern Jerusalem who was the premier field worker for the Israeli B’tselem organization; and Iyad a-Sarraj, a psychiatrist who founded and headed the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, which was active in monitoring human rights abuses. To silence these gadflies, or at least reduce their effectiveness, Arafat had them arrested, interrogated, threatened, and publicly accused of disloyalty to the Palestinian national cause. When this proved insufficient, he made every effort to strip them of the resources they needed for carrying out their work.
The first to face this treatment was a-Sourani, who was detained by Palestinian police in Gaza in February 1995, shortly after his center issued a release attacking Arafat for caving in to Israeli demands to establish a state security court and calling on the international community to pressure the PA into rescinding the order.136 The PA’s attorney general, Khaled al-Qidra, who interrogated a-Sourani personally, told him that “the chairman feels completely offended that you have communicated such incredible insults.” Publicly, al-Qidra impugned a-Sourani’s motives, declaring that it is illegal to “cover your face and work politically under the name of human rights.”137 After being questioned by the attorney general, a-Sourani was released, but was re-arrested and interrogated a few days later. Undeterred, he sought to organize a workshop in Gaza a month later on the state security courts. Gaza police chief Ghazi Jibali refused to grant a-Sourani a permit, and instead subjected him to a smear campaign, claiming that, “The workshop is aimed at embarrassing the PNA, and the Center is acting as if it is above the law.”138
When a-Sourani responded by releasing a statement criticizing Jibali’s decision, PA officials worked to force his removal as head of the Gaza Center for Rights and Law.139 Justice Minister Freih Abu Medein informed board members that the center “got a lot of money from the Ford Foundation… and they never came to pay the tax”—which carried the implication that the organization would be hit with a heavy fine unless they hired a new director immediately.140 In April 1995, the center’s four-man board voted unanimously to fire a-Sourani, ostensibly for “professional reasons.”141 Subsequently, the Gaza Center was reduced to a level of effectiveness similar to that of al-Haq: Though it occasionally released a tepid statement to the press, it ceased to be a force for human rights.142
A-Sarraj’s turn came in December 1995, several months after he replaced Hanan Ashrawi as director of PICCR and began trying to make the organization more independent of the government. The specific trigger for his arrest and ten-hour detention was a speech to participants in a European-sponsored conference, in which he claimed to have received no response to more than 400 complaints on human rights that he had filed with the PA’s attorney general.143 Like a-Sourani, a-Sarraj was not deterred by this episode. After his release, he hastened to berate the PA publicly, telling reporters that the heads of the PLO “belong to a different culture in which the slogans of human rights and democracy have no real force inside. Their excuse is that, ‘We are democratic but we are not Sweden. We are the Third World and our people need to be beaten.’”144 Seeing that the short detention had achieved little, the PA arrested a-Sarraj twice more within the next several months, holding him first for more than a week, and then for more than two weeks. During his third detention, he was beaten and kicked—for which offense he was accused of assaulting a policeman, a charge that was dropped only under heavy international pressure.145
In the case of Eid, PA officials varied the approach slightly, beginning with a campaign of smears and threats, and only subsequently arresting and interrogating him. The immediate cause for the campaign was a report Eid prepared for B’tselem in August 1995 called “Neither Law Nor Justice,” which excoriated the practices of Rajoub’s PSS in the West Bank just as the PLO was trying to conclude an interim agreement giving it control over Arab-populated areas there.146 PA Attorney General al-Qidra declared the report “baseless,” said that it “aims to damage the Palestinian Authority,” and stressed that its massive flaws stemmed from the fact that B’tselem was an Israeli organization which had a political agenda not in line with the Palestinians’ national aspirations.147 Rajoub went even further, launching a personal attack on Eid that was widely covered in the Arabic-language press. According to Rajoub:
The most important consequence of this strategy was that the two leading Palestinian rights organizations in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem adopted a low profile during the Gaza-Jericho period. The director of al-Haq, Fatah Azzam, decided that quiet contacts, letter-writing to the authorities, and private meetings should be preferred, with going public saved as a last resort.131 His organization occasionally put out releases criticizing particular acts by the PA, but nothing comparable in frequency or scope to the hard-hitting reports that had marked its treatment of Israeli abuses.132 The Palestinian Human Rights Information Center, a subsidiary of the Arab Studies Society based in the Orient House, in eastern Jerusalem, issued its last public criticisms of the PA in August 1994.133 The longtime director of PHRIC, Jan Abu Shakra, resigned in October of that year, apparently because the Arab Studies Society threatened to cut off funding if the group publicly attacked PA abuses.134 Subsequently, PHRIC cut back on activity and issued statements only to castigate Israel or defend the PA.135
Nonetheless, Arafat was not successful in taming all the Palestinian human rights activists, and a small group of courageous and principled individuals continued to criticize the PA’s practices from the inauguration of the Palestinian government and on through election day. The most prominent of these were Raji a-Sourani, a lawyer who had headed the prestigious Gaza Center for Rights and Law beginning in 1990; Bassem Eid, a Palestinian from eastern Jerusalem who was the premier field worker for the Israeli B’tselem organization; and Iyad a-Sarraj, a psychiatrist who founded and headed the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, which was active in monitoring human rights abuses. To silence these gadflies, or at least reduce their effectiveness, Arafat had them arrested, interrogated, threatened, and publicly accused of disloyalty to the Palestinian national cause. When this proved insufficient, he made every effort to strip them of the resources they needed for carrying out their work.
The first to face this treatment was a-Sourani, who was detained by Palestinian police in Gaza in February 1995, shortly after his center issued a release attacking Arafat for caving in to Israeli demands to establish a state security court and calling on the international community to pressure the PA into rescinding the order.136 The PA’s attorney general, Khaled al-Qidra, who interrogated a-Sourani personally, told him that “the chairman feels completely offended that you have communicated such incredible insults.” Publicly, al-Qidra impugned a-Sourani’s motives, declaring that it is illegal to “cover your face and work politically under the name of human rights.”137 After being questioned by the attorney general, a-Sourani was released, but was re-arrested and interrogated a few days later. Undeterred, he sought to organize a workshop in Gaza a month later on the state security courts. Gaza police chief Ghazi Jibali refused to grant a-Sourani a permit, and instead subjected him to a smear campaign, claiming that, “The workshop is aimed at embarrassing the PNA, and the Center is acting as if it is above the law.”138
When a-Sourani responded by releasing a statement criticizing Jibali’s decision, PA officials worked to force his removal as head of the Gaza Center for Rights and Law.139 Justice Minister Freih Abu Medein informed board members that the center “got a lot of money from the Ford Foundation… and they never came to pay the tax”—which carried the implication that the organization would be hit with a heavy fine unless they hired a new director immediately.140 In April 1995, the center’s four-man board voted unanimously to fire a-Sourani, ostensibly for “professional reasons.”141 Subsequently, the Gaza Center was reduced to a level of effectiveness similar to that of al-Haq: Though it occasionally released a tepid statement to the press, it ceased to be a force for human rights.142
A-Sarraj’s turn came in December 1995, several months after he replaced Hanan Ashrawi as director of PICCR and began trying to make the organization more independent of the government. The specific trigger for his arrest and ten-hour detention was a speech to participants in a European-sponsored conference, in which he claimed to have received no response to more than 400 complaints on human rights that he had filed with the PA’s attorney general.143 Like a-Sourani, a-Sarraj was not deterred by this episode. After his release, he hastened to berate the PA publicly, telling reporters that the heads of the PLO “belong to a different culture in which the slogans of human rights and democracy have no real force inside. Their excuse is that, ‘We are democratic but we are not Sweden. We are the Third World and our people need to be beaten.’”144 Seeing that the short detention had achieved little, the PA arrested a-Sarraj twice more within the next several months, holding him first for more than a week, and then for more than two weeks. During his third detention, he was beaten and kicked—for which offense he was accused of assaulting a policeman, a charge that was dropped only under heavy international pressure.145
In the case of Eid, PA officials varied the approach slightly, beginning with a campaign of smears and threats, and only subsequently arresting and interrogating him. The immediate cause for the campaign was a report Eid prepared for B’tselem in August 1995 called “Neither Law Nor Justice,” which excoriated the practices of Rajoub’s PSS in the West Bank just as the PLO was trying to conclude an interim agreement giving it control over Arab-populated areas there.146 PA Attorney General al-Qidra declared the report “baseless,” said that it “aims to damage the Palestinian Authority,” and stressed that its massive flaws stemmed from the fact that B’tselem was an Israeli organization which had a political agenda not in line with the Palestinians’ national aspirations.147 Rajoub went even further, launching a personal attack on Eid that was widely covered in the Arabic-language press. According to Rajoub:
It is no secret that Bassem Eid, who prepared this report, worked in the Israeli police force before joining B’tselem. And we all know what it means for a Palestinian to work in the Israeli police.148
The thinly veiled accusation that Eid was a collaborator implied that it was legitimate for Palestinian patriots to injure or even kill him.149
This tactic, crude as it was, had an impact on Eid’s freedom of movement and his ability to gain the trust of Palestinians who knew about cases of abuse. “Before,” Eid explained in an interview in November 1995, “whenever I wanted to check something out in the territories, I’d just get into my car and go, but ever since Rajoub called me a collaborator, I can’t do that anymore. I’ve got to be more careful.”150 Before entering West Bank towns or refugee camps, Eid had to get clearance from high-ranking Fatah officials or travel with a family member of a known Fatah activist, which impaired his ability to get information—especially in light of the close association between Fatah and the PSS forces responsible for many of the abuses.151 In addition, many residents of the West Bank, not knowing whether the accusations against Eid were true, became hesitant to share their stories with him.
This tactic, crude as it was, had an impact on Eid’s freedom of movement and his ability to gain the trust of Palestinians who knew about cases of abuse. “Before,” Eid explained in an interview in November 1995, “whenever I wanted to check something out in the territories, I’d just get into my car and go, but ever since Rajoub called me a collaborator, I can’t do that anymore. I’ve got to be more careful.”150 Before entering West Bank towns or refugee camps, Eid had to get clearance from high-ranking Fatah officials or travel with a family member of a known Fatah activist, which impaired his ability to get information—especially in light of the close association between Fatah and the PSS forces responsible for many of the abuses.151 In addition, many residents of the West Bank, not knowing whether the accusations against Eid were true, became hesitant to share their stories with him.
