A group of British intellectuals including writers, artists, trade unionists and politicians has written an open letter, in which they have called on the Israeli regime to stop abusing Palestinian children.

The letter entitled œAction for Palestine” report published in the Guardian newspaper called on Israeli authorities to implement following recommendations.

1) An end to Israel™s nighttime raids and shackling of Palestinian children; 2) Audio-visual recordings of all interrogations; 3) Parents given the right to be present during questioning and the child™s right to access to a lawyer before their interrogation respected; 4) An end to the transfer of children to prisons inside Israel in breach of article 76 of the fourth Geneva convention; 5) An end to the use of solitary confinement.

According to Defence for Children International – Palestine Section there were 195 Palestinian children jailed and under prosecution by the Israeli occupation as of July this year.

Another report by B™Tselem has revealed shocking conditions under which Palestinian children kidnapped by Israeli occupation troops are routinely and systematically being abused including torture and threats of rape.

œChildren are often held in solitary confinement and subjected to interrogations without lawyers or parents present, in which they are threatened and coerced into confessing to throwing stones or molotov cocktails at occupation troops”, the report says.

Several sitting members of parliament (MPs) including Caroline Lucas, the sole MP for the Green Party in the UK parliament and some members of the main opposition Labor Party also endorsed the letter.

Dave Prentis and Rodney Bickerstaffe, the current and former leaders of UNISON, the UK™s biggest trade union respectively, and Bob Crow, head of the maritime and railway workers™ union RMT also endorsed the call for the Israeli regime to stop abusing Palestinian children.

The letter is a follow-up to another report entitled the œChildren in Military Custody”, which was written by prominent UK legal experts last year.

As activist Asa Winstanley reported at the time, œChildren in Military Custody” noted that the systematic abuse its authors found likely œstems from a belief, which was advanced to us by [an Israeli] military prosecutor, that every Palestinian child is a ˜potential terrorist.™”

œBut in the time since the report appeared, no action has been taken by the UK or any other European government to hold Israel accountable for the crimes and abuses against children that it documents”, wrote Winstanley.

MOL/HE

Copyright: Press TV