Two significant dates were commemorated in the past year: the 40th year of Israel's occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and twenty years since the outbreak of the first Intifada. The context of these two events provides a broad perspective on the human rights situation that has followed in their wake.
Two clear themes characterize Israel's policies in many spheres that B'Tselem addresses. The first is the tendency to claim that policies and practices implemented in the Occupied Territories are justified in the name of security, without substantiating this justification or ensuring that legal standards are met. Almost completely absent is the mandatory balancing of security needs with other important values, including protecting the rights of Palestinians living under Israel's control. The second theme is the lack of accountability of Israel's security forces in matters relating to human rights in the Occupied Territories. This is expressed in the reluctance of the state to thoroughly investigate violations and to prosecute those responsible for them, as well as in the denial of most Palestinians' right to compensation when they are injured through no fault of their own by Israeli forces.
One welcome improvement in the human rights situation in the past year is that the number of Palestinians and Israelis killed in clashes in the West Bank and Gaza has dropped. However, alongside this development has been deterioration in many other measures of the human rights situation in the Occupied Territories. Highlights from B'Tselem's year-end report illustrates some of these:
- In 2007, there was an increase of 13 percent in the number of Palestinians held in administrative detention without trial, which averaged 830 people.
- 66 staffed checkpoints and 459 physical roadblocks on average controlled movement inside the West Bank. There was little improvement in Palestinians' freedom of movement, despite the promised easing of restrictions.
- Israeli settlement population grew by 4.5% (compared with 1.5% population growth inside Israel ), a more moderate increase than the previous year.
- Israel continues the freeze policy on family unification, denying tens of thousands of Palestinians the right to a family life. However, in what was termed a one-time gesture, Israel approved family unification for some 3,500 Palestinian families.
- The number of houses demolished in East Jerusalem rose by 38 percent, to 69 homes.
- Palestinians continue to face severe discrimination in the allocation of water in the West Bank , causing serious hardship in the summer.
- The number of Palestinians killed in intra-Palestinian clashes was the highest throughout the Intifada.
- The humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip has declined drastically as a result of Israel's siege policy that prevents access of essential foodstuffs, medication, and limits the supply of fuel and electricity.
B'Tselem has continued to do battle with these policies and their impact, and despite Israel's persistent attempts to evade responsibility, has succeeded in placing these issues on the public agenda, and in some cases bringing about incremental change.
Highlights of B'Tselem's major program accomplishments during the past year include:
- For the first time in over a decade, B'Tselem published a report presenting a broad survey of the spectrum of human rights issues in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with an emphasis on those issues under direct Israeli control.
- Through strategically launched video footage of a settler woman in Hebron attacking a Palestinian family that was covered by most major domestic and international news channels including CNN, BBC, ABC, NBC and MBC, B'Tselem initiated a campaign highlighting the failure of Israeli law enforcement in Hebron that leaves Palestinians residents of the city without protection from settler violence and illustrating the restraints on freedom of movement imposed on Palestinians that render life in the city untenable.
- B'Tselem published a unique study on the infringement of the human rights of the tens of thousands of Palestinian workers staying in Israel without a permit in a report entitled Crossing the Line.
- B'Tselem, together with the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, published the report Ghost Town: Israel's Separation Policy and Forced Eviction of Palestinians from the Center of Hebron, which documents for the time the extent to which Israel's policies designed to segregate Palestinians from the Jewish settlers in the city has led to the "quiet transfer" of the Palestinian population of Hebron's city center.
- B'Tselem launched an initiative to target the Russian-speaking community in Israel, introducing a new Russian website and translating press releases, briefings and selected materials into Russian.
- In Absolute Prohibition: The Torture and Ill-treatment of Palestinian Detainees, B'Tselem published the first report since the landmark ruling prohibiting the use of torture in security interrogations detailing the maltreatment, and in some cases torture, of Palestinian detainees interrogated by the Israel Security Agency.
- B'Tselem, together with other Israeli human rights organizations, held a public event in the heart of Tel Aviv to mark 40 years of Israel's occupation, exploring the human rights violations in the Occupied Territoriesand also examining the negative impact of the occupation on Israeli society.
- B'Tselem documented the debilitating impact of the network of movement restrictions imposed on Palestinians in the West Bank in its report Ground to a Halt: Denial of Palestinians' Movement in the West Bank.
- B'Tselem fieldworkers gathered 1180 testimonies during 2007.
- B'Tselem's website, which now appears in four languages: Hebrew Arabic, English and Russian, has received over 2,500 visitors on average every day in 2007.
- B'Tselem has expanded its use of visual images as a tool to promote human rights, reaching over 800 hours of total archive footage.Over 80,000 people have viewed B'Tselem videos on our website in 2007, 70% of whom are from within Israel 300,000 individuals have viewed B'Tselem's videos on additional Internet sites that include YouTube/Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Democracy Now and Flix, among others.
- B'Tselem provided 48 study tours for groups and individuals, as well as over 140 briefings and presentations