Ramallah: Israeli regime soldiers have been criticised for temporarily detaining an 11-year-old Palestinian boy with a mental disability suspected of throwing stones at them.
The Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem has claimed that the boy who is unable to speak was handcuffed, blindfolded and held on the floor of an army jeep until his father arrived and convinced the soldiers to release his son.
A B’Tselem volunteer filmed the incident from a nearby window and B’Tselem has claimed that the recording shows that Palestinian residents told the soldiers that the boy was developmentally disabled. The footage is also said to show colonists from Kiryat Arba observing the incident from behind the colony’s fence. According to B’Tselem, some colonists were recorded calling out encouragement to the soldiers and some of these comments were racist.
The detention incident occurred because Palestinian children had been throwing stones at soldiers on the main road of the Jabel Johar neighbourhood in Hebron, close to the colony of Kiryat Arba.
In response to the footage, the Israeli army announced that it would investigate the incident. The army said that the soldiers released the Palestinian boy after he was apprehended. Regime authorities often claim to investigate such cases, but human rights organisations say they rarely lead to disciplinary measures.
Hebron is the scene of daily clashes between Palestinian residents and colonists and the Israeli occupation forces. The practices of the Israeli soldiers have been condemned by the Palestinian residents who argue that Israeli soldiers detain even those who happen to be near the scene of clashes.
Sources in Hebron told Gulf News that upon their arrival, Israeli soldiers start detaining people and that even the brief testimony of a soldier is enough to indict a Palestinian. The typical charge used is stone throwing.
The sources said that the majority of those detained by Israeli soldiers are not involved in stone throwing but the soldiers do not take the time to identify those actually involved. Stone throwing is considered by Palestinians to be a legitimate right for the occupied to use to resist the occupier.
