West News Wire: According to a recent study by the UN special rapporteur on the Palestinian territories, the West Bank has become an open-air prison for Palestinians due to Israeli control of the Palestinian territory.
According to the research, Israeli soldiers have detained more than 800,000 Palestinians since 1967, many of them have endured lengthy detentions and are frequently “presumed guilty without evidence.”
“The more so considering that these transgressions seem to be a part of a strategy to de-Palestinianize the region. As a result, the Palestinian people’s continued existence as a unitary nation is in danger. During a meeting of the Human Rights Council on Monday, Albanese stressed the importance of the world community acknowledging the illegality of the Israeli occupation.
Due to the siege that Gaza has been subjected to since 2007, Albanese has expanded the term “open-air prison” to cover additional Palestinian regions, such as the occupied West Bank.
According to Albanese in the report, “this wider carcerality, made up of a variety of laws, procedures, and coercive confinement techniques, transforms the occupied Palestinian territory into a constantly watched open-air panopticon.”
The “presence of illegal colonies” made up of Israeli settlers, according to the special rapporteur, has further enhanced the surveillance system surrounding Palestinians and severely restricted their freedom of movement.
“The Israeli regime has turned the occupied territory into a ‘panopticon,’ where Palestinians are constantly surveilled and disciplined,” she claimed, citing a variety of physical, bureaucratic, and digital measures.
The rights organisation Addameer estimates that there are presently 5,000 political prisoners from Palestine in Israeli jails.
Albanese demanded that all Palestinian kids and others being detained “for acts devoid of offensiveness under international law” be freed from Israeli custody.
One of the cornerstones of Israel’s apartheid system, according to Albanese, is the practise of arbitrary arrests and administrative detention arrest without accusation or trial for an indeterminate period of time.
She also urged Israel to allow the bodies of murdered Palestinians to be released and ensure that they are given “dignified burials”.
Albanese has criticised Israel’s treatment of Palestinians since taking on her position in April 2022 and asserted that Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid and acting as a settler colonial state.
She has also been the target of a campaign by right-wing Israeli organisations calling for her resignation from her UN position.
Over the past few months, Israeli aggression against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank has increased, culminating in a military operation in the city of Jenin that resulted in the deaths of 12 Palestinians and the injuries of dozens more.
The violence has persisted ever since. A Palestinian man was killed on Monday by Israeli soldiers close to Ramallah.
Members of the Israeli government have been promoting the growth of illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank at the same time.
In defiance of international law, nearly 700,000 Israeli settlers reside in more than 250 settlements and outposts throughout the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
The US, a staunch supporter of Israel, has often denounced Israel for escalating settlement activity in the West Bank. According to the Biden administration, this activity “is an obstacle to the realisation of a two-state solution.”
The US, however, has also taken action to defend Israel from criticism about its settlement strategy. Washington declared in February that it will reject a UN Security Council resolution that would denounce Israeli settlements.
In an interview with CNN on Sunday, President Biden stated that one of the problems with the West Bank is that the Israeli government’s present ministers are pushing for settlement.
“The West Bank is not entirely Israel’s problem right now, but they are a part of the problem, especially those members of the government who believe that we can settle anywhere we choose. According to President Biden, Fareed Zakaria of CNN, “[The Palestinians] have no right to be here, etc.
Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, two far-right members of Israel’s ruling coalition, declared on Monday that Israel has the right to create settlements everywhere in the West Bank. Ben Gvir added: “We will not compromise on any hill, on any outpost. Ours is this.
