Publication Date
September 10, 2012
QALANDIA CHECKPOINT, BORDER ZONE, PALESTINE -- Beside the separation wall near Qalandia Checkpoint sits a military court, a set of portable buildings, where Palestinian citizens are tried for committing crimes against the state of Israel. In the chaotic and crowded hearing room, an 18-year-old girl sits with her feet shackled as she waits for proceedings to start.
She appears buoyant as she carries on a lively conversation with her grandfather across the room. On the surface, she seems unconcerned with her freedom. At today’s hearing Aisha’s attorney will attempt to reduce her 24-month sentence. The court proceedings and the circumstances of her arrest are familiar territory for the teen.
Aisha, whose last name was withheld at her attorney’s request, was arrested two years earlier when, at 16, she walked to a military checkpoint in her hometown of Hebron, drew a knife, and announced that she intended to stab an Israeli soldier.
Her former attorney, Ibrahim Hamza, from Defense for Children International, DCI, says that upon reviewing her case, he discovered that she dealt with significant domestic violence at home. The court psychologist confirmed his initial assessment and Aisha’s sentence was reduced from 24 to 10 months. The judge warned Aisha that if she committed the same crime again, she would receive the full sentence. Now, Aisha has been arrested for committing the exact same crime – threatening to kill an Israeli soldier with a knife, at a checkpoint.
Many court cases dealing with young Palestinian girls arrested in the West Bank tend to follow this pattern. Mahmoud Malik, who requested his full name not be used, an advocate with DCI, reported that as many as six Palestinian girls in Israeli detention centers who were arrested in 2009 admitted to committing crimes to escape domestic issues. For these girls, detention centers are not always perceived as a place of imprisonment. For many, they are a preferable alternative to their situations at home.
Intentional arrest is a sensitive issue here that is debated by many. While attorneys and child advocates have researched the phenomenon and have collected affidavits by many girls who say they sought arrest, many others say this is just another example of Israeli officers playing politics with Palestinian youth. Still, one counselor with the YMCA in Beit Sahour says often the girls who come out of prison, after having a reprieve from their difficult family lives, have a renewed sense of strength and purpose.
DCI’s 2009 annual report included an affidavit from a 14-year-old girl identified as Bara’a M., who, like Aisha, went to Qalandia Checkpoint with a knife hidden up the sleeve of her jacket. When she was asked why she had a knife, she said, “I have problems with my family and I came to the checkpoint to get arrested.”
At age 7, Bara’a says she was forced to wear a hijab and two years later, her family made her wear a Jibab, a full-length coat, which caused her to feel stifled and imprisoned. “Basically, they took away my freedom,” she told DCI.
Her friend, identified in the report as Samah S., also 14, accompanied her to the checkpoint and secured her own arrest by carrying a kitchen knife in her purse. She was motivated to do so for a very specific reason, writing in her affidavit, “My family wanted me to marry a 35-year-old policeman and I refused. It was supposed to take place two or three days from now. I therefore decided to head to the checkpoint and do anything that would get me arrested.”
The issue of intentional arrest by teenaged Palestinians remains largely unrecognized here. But many others here do not believe the DCI report and have alternate interpretations of the arrests.
Ayman Ramahi, former head of the education center at the Jalazone refugee camp near Ramallah, where the two girls, Bara’a and Samah, are from, says he believes the Israeli security forces at Qalandia fabricated the charges against the girls.
“Who can go there with a knife or anything else to stab a soldier at a checkpoint like Qalandia?” he said. “It’s unbelievable that anyone has a mind would try this.”
He admits that in places like Hebron, domestic problems exist within homes or communities, but he says life in Jalazone is different. “If you talk about somewhere like Jalazone, the girls have freedom to do what they want, they have full access to education, treatment, everything,” he says, adding that his own daughter is studying at the university level.
However, despite Ramahi’s allegations, the Israeli soldiers at the checkpoints have not been accused of fabricating evidence in these cases, as many of the girls admitted in their affidavits that they carried those knives to the checkpoint with a specific intention.
Malik of DCI says that while the girl’s intentions were clear, the specific charges against some of these girls are questionable. Samah S. for example was charged with the crime of “intending to kill an Israeli soldier.” According to DCI, when she arrived at Qalandia Checkpoint she never removed the kitchen knife from her bag, it was found by security forces who searched her. In her affidavit, she claims that during her interrogation security forces continually screamed at her, “You came here to stab a soldier!” In her affidavit, she explained to the interrogator she was attempting to get away from home, yet after intense questioning, she relented and agreed with the claim that she intended to stab a soldier.
Mona Zaghrout, head of the counseling and supervision department at the YMCA Rehabilitation Program in the town of Beit Sahour, says after these girls are released from prison they experience difficulties readjusting to daily life. Since May of 2010, Zaghrout says only three girls released from prison have come to the counseling program at the YMCA. “The girls come out of prison very nervous and having less confidence in themselves, their families and their community,” she says.
But Zaghrout says she does see a positive side to time spent in prison and away from families. “The positive thing is that after working with them, they insist on challenging themselves, their families, and the community by building strong futures for themselves,” she says.
