The Governing Council of the Inter-Parliamentary Union,

Referring to the case of the above-mentioned parliamentarians, all of whom were elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) in January 2006, as outlined in the report of the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians (CL/189/11(b)-R.1), and to the resolution adopted at its 188th session (April 2011),

Referring to the report on the hearing of 26 July 2011 before the Supreme Court regarding the revocation of the Jerusalem residency permits of Mr. Muhammad Abu-Teir, Mr. Ahmad Attoun and Mr. Mohamed Totah, prepared by Barrister Alex McBride (CL/189/11(b)-R.2),

Referring also to the study produced by the Israeli non-governmental organization Yesh Din (Volunteers for Human Rights) on the implementation of due process rights in Israeli military courts in the West Bank, entitled "Backyard Proceedings", which reveals the absence of due process rights in those courts, and to the study published in September 2006 by B’Tselem (the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories) and entitled "Barred from Contact: Violation of the Right to Visit Palestinians Held in Israeli Prisons",

Taking into account the communication from the Permanent Mission of Israel to the United Nations Offices at Geneva, dated 13 September 2011, forwarding a note prepared by the competent authorities on Israeli law regarding administrative detention,

Recalling the following: the parliamentarians concerned were elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council in January 2006 on the Change and Reform Party list (Hamas) and were arrested following the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier on 25 June 2006, prosecuted and found guilty of membership in a terrorist organization (Hamas), of holding a seat in parliament on behalf of that organization, of providing services to it by sitting on parliamentary committees, and of supporting an illegal organization; they were sentenced to prison terms of up to 40 months,

Considering that, while most of them were released after serving their sentences, many were subsequently rearrested, sometimes several times, and placed in administrative detention; that currently 19 of them are held in administrative detention,¹ seven of whom have been taken into administrative detention since July 2011,

Bearing in mind the following information provided regarding administrative detention:

• The Israeli authorities point out that Military Order 1651, which empowers the commander of the IDF to detain a person administratively for up to six months, which period may be prolonged if the rationale for the detention is still applicable, is based on the Law of Belligerent Occupation as specified in Article 78 of the 4th Geneva Convention; it is a legal instrument in order to maintain public order or security in the Area; the Israeli Supreme Court has ruled that in order to apply the exceptional measure of administrative detention, there must be a specific and concrete threat posed by a person which is based on current and reliable information; the Court has also determined that all possibilities of using alternative criminal procedure must have been exhausted before resorting to administrative detention; there are two means of judicial review, namely the independent and impartial military courts have the authority to assess the material relevant to the said detainee in order to determine whether the decision to detain him/her was reasonable, given his/her general rights to a fair trial and freedom of movement; the second is the military prosecution which implements a "cautious and level-headed" policy in the use of administrative detention, which is reflected in fewer administrative detention orders;

• Human rights organization in and outside Israel have stressed that military commanders in the West Bank are entitled to impose administrative detention of up to six months if they have "reasonable grounds to presume that the security of the area or public security requires detention"; the Order neither defines the terms "security of the area" and "public security" nor stipulates a maximum cumulative period of administrative detention; it thus allows indefinite arbitrary detention; charges against prisoners, including the parliamentarians in question, are usually those of being a "security threat", but the area and nature of the threat are not specified and evidence not disclosed; although administrative detainees are entitled to appeal, its exercise is ineffective as the detainee and his lawyers lack access to the information on which the orders are based and are therefore unable to present a meaningful defence,

Recalling further the following:

• On 28 May 2006, the then Israeli Minister of the Interior revoked the Jerusalem residency permits for Mr. Abu-Teir, Mr. Totah and Mr. Attoun, arguing that they had shown disloyalty to Israel by holding seats in the PLC; the order was not implemented owing to their arrest on 26 June 2006; after their release in May-June 2010, they were immediately notified that they had to leave East Jerusalem; Abu-Teir was ordered to leave by 19 June 2010 and, refusing to do so, he was arrested on 30 June 2010 and later deported to the West Bank; the other two parliamentarians were ordered to leave by 3 July 2010 and, likewise refusing to comply with the order, they took refuge in the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) building in Jerusalem; according to the sources, on the morning of 26 September 2011, when Mohammed Atoun was about to give an interview to Al-Quds television, four Israeli security forces dressed as lawyers entered the ICRC compound and violently arrested Attoun damaging his glasses in the process. He was first taken to the Russian Compound Detention Centre but, when seen by a doctor there, was taken to a hospital on account of his deteriorating state of health. From the hospital, although he was suffering from severe chest pain, he was reportedly taken back to the detention centre the same day. The reason he has been given for his arrest is his continuing presence in Jerusalem despite the Ministerial Order for him to be deported. The sources believe that he will most likely be charged with illegally entering Israel;

• A petition against the revocation of their residency permit and deportation order was submitted to the Supreme Court, which heard oral argument on 26 July 2011; the Court reserved its judgment to an unspecified future; the IPU trial observer who was present at the hearing, concluding that the hearing fell short of some basic principles of fairness, stated the following in this regard; it was of particular concern that "in circumstances where the very basis of the petitioner’s challenge was the secret material that had been used to their great legal detriment, the Supreme Court made no attempt to disclose a redacted version of that material to the petitioners, or to enable them otherwise to understand and challenge the basis on which their legal rights were altered"; this breached the "equality of arms" principle as a central safeguard of any adversarial trial system; the seriousness of these shortcomings was compounded by the court’s decision "to proceed with little apparent regard for several of the petitioners" submissions; the observer referred in this regard in particular to Article 11 of the Entry into Israel Law which is drafted in terms "which are remarkably broad"; "the Supreme Court would not, however, hear submissions on the ambit of the respondents (the Minister’s) power to revoke a person’s residency rights or on the criteria that he ought to apply when coming to such a decision". The observer considered that "the hearing of 26 July 2011 fell short of the obligation that is fundamental to a legal system which purports to be based on the rule of law - the duty to ensure that justice is seen to be done".

Considering that, according to the terms of the Israel-Hamas brokered prisoner exchange, on 16 October 2011 Israel published a list of 477 Palestinian prisoners to be released in a first stage in exchange for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, captured in 2006 during a cross-border attack on Israeli military installations, and that the release procedures are currently under way,

Bearing in mind finally that, in its concluding observations on the third periodic report of Israel under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR),² the Human Rights Committee recommended inter alia that all persons under Israel’s jurisdiction and effective control be afforded full enjoyment of the rights enshrined in the Covenant,

1. Thanks the Israeli authorities for the information provided;

2. Acknowledges that, at the normative level and that of relevant jurisprudence by the Supreme Court, safeguards are provided for with a view to preventing the abusive use of administrative detention; nevertheless notes with regret that the reality of administrative detention is quite different, mainly owing to the lack of any effective possibility for the detainees to defend themselves, with the result that they are open to arbitrary treatment;

3. Reaffirms therefore that not only does the practice of administrative detention violate the international human rights norms to which Israel has subscribed as a party to the ICCPR, but also impedes any proper functioning of the PLC as its members can be arrested at any time and placed in administrative detention for as long as the Israeli military authorities wish;

4. Thanks Mr. Alex McBride for his observer report, whose conclusions only confirm the extent to which the secrecy of proceedings is detrimental to respect for fundamental rights;

5. Deeply regrets that, while the Supreme Court has not as yet ruled on the revocation of the residency permits, Mr. Abu-Teir has already been deported and Mr. Attoun was arrested on the premises of an international organization in highly questionable circumstances, and risks deportation as well;

6. Reaffirms that, over and above the compelling legal grounds which prohibit the deportation of the PLC members concerned and the fact that the argument of disloyalty - in itself highly questionable - must fail since the Israeli authorities accepted the participation of Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem in the elections, the deportation would constitute an inhuman act against the persons concerned, their families and their community;

7. Consequently urges the Israeli authorities once again to revoke the deportation orders and to issue the persons concerned with the residency permits to which they are entitled;

8. Calls once again on the Israeli authorities to release the detained PLC members forthwith, and wishes to ascertain their current status, in particular whether any of them are on the list of Palestinian prisoners to be released under the ongoing prisoner swap, as well as their conditions of detention and state of health;

9. Reiterates its call on the Israeli authorities, and in particular the Knesset, to heed the recommendations made by the international human rights bodies and mechanisms in this regard, most recently by the United Nations Human Rights Committee in its concluding observations on Israel’s 3rd periodic report under the ICCPR, and to bring their practices into conformity with the State’s international human rights obligations and hence ensure that all persons under Israel’s jurisdiction and effective control are afforded full enjoyment of the rights enshrined in the ICCPR;

10. Requests the Secretary General to forward this resolution to the Israeli authorities and to the sources, inviting them to provide the requested information;

11. Requests the Committeecontinue examining this case and report to it at its next session, to be held during the 126th IPU Assembly (March/April 2012).

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1. Hatem Qafisha (PAL/47), Mahmoud al-Ramahi (PAL/48), Nayef Al-Rujub (PAL/17), Mohamed Al-Tal (PAL/35), Khalil Al-Rabia (PAL/25), Omar Al-Raziq (PAL/16), Mohammed Al-Natseh (PAL/55), Azzam Abd Al-Rahman Salhab (PAL/53), Mohammed Badir (PAL/34), Nizar Abd Alziz Ramadan (PAL/52), Abdel Rahman Zaidan (PAL/49), Ahmed Al-Haj Ali (PAL/56), Samir Al Qadi (PAL/38), Nasser Abdel Jawad (PAL/27), Muhammed Abu Jahasha (PAL/43), Anwar Zboun (PAL/22), Mohammed Abu Teir (PAL/28), Sheik Fadel Saleh Hamdan (PAL/36) and Ahmad Attoun (PAL/29)
2. CCPR/C/ISR/CO/3

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