April 5th marks Palestinian Child’s Day, it is not celebration rather it is a day highlighting the horrific treatment of Palestinian children by the occupying Israeli authorities.
On this day in 1995, President Yasser Arafat abided by the Convention on the Rights of the Child and dedicated the day as the Palestinian Child’s Day.
For Palestinian children, the commemoration reeks of hypocrisy and opportunism. On this day, despite Israel’s colonial violence and military occupation being common knowledge, Palestinian children are divested of their own reality; their violation at the hands of Israelis is normalised; and their dreams of a normal life are generalised without context.
In a statement released, the Commission of Detainees Affairs said that the Israeli army have abducted and imprisoned nearly 10.000 Palestinian children since the Al-Aqsa Intifada started in late September of the year 2000, facing various types of violations and oppression, abused basic rights guaranteed by International Law and all related human rights resolutions, hundreds of detained children reached adulthood while in prison.
Over the last four years, Israel passed strict laws on the imprisoned children, including the child can be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison, after the uprising of October 2015, the number of detained children has reached more than 400 in some months, which is the highest number of imprisoned children since February of 2009, the Commission of Detainees Affairs added.
500-700 Palestinian children, between the ages of 12 and 17, are abducted by Israeli soldiers every year, and they are interrogated, and tortured, the committee revealed
There are 180 children held in Israeli jails, and 3 killed by Israeli soldiers since the beginning of this year.
Children denied opportunities to learn through a good education, denied access to healthcare, or denied stability when they see their homes demolished, are not experiencing a safe childhood. Those at risk of arrest, exploitation, or violence are being failed by the complex legal system that operates across the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
The Palestinian Children Day aims to highlight the difference between Palestinian children and their peers as their vulnerability is ignored by Israeli forces on a daily basis. It aims to attract the world’s attention to the challenges they face as their rights to safety and education are chipped away.
Meanwhile, Access to education is difficult for children who live in refugee camps and villages that do not have a school.
According to a 2013 UNICEF study, more than 2,500 children within educated communities travel through at least one checkpoint per day to go to school.
Treatment in the Israeli military detention system remains “widespread, systematic, and institutionalized throughout the process,” according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) report Children in Israeli Military Detention Observations and Recommendations.
