Israelis accused of torturing suspects

JERUSALEM — Israel's domestic security service, Shin Bet, routinely mistreats and sometimes tortures Palestinian suspects under interrogation despite a Supreme Court ruling that bars the use of physical force during questioning, two Israeli human-rights groups said in a report released Sunday.

The study by B'Tselem and the Center for the Defense of the Individual is based on testimonies by 73 Palestinians arrested between July 2005 and January 2006, most of whom were interviewed in jail by a lawyer on behalf of the rights groups.

The Israeli Justice Ministry said the report was based on an unrepresentative sample of prisoners that "distorts reality." Shin Bet interrogations were carried out "according to the law," and the lives of many Israelis have been saved by information obtained through such questioning, the ministry said.

B'Tselem research director Yehezkel Lein, the report's author, said it did not claim to provide a representative sample, but the testimonies provided a snapshot of the treatment of Palestinian detainees.

An Israeli Supreme Court ruling in 1999 said that Shin Bet did not have legal authority to use physical force during interrogations, specifically outlawing three methods that human-rights groups called torture. But the court said Shin Bet agents who used force to obtain information about a "ticking bomb" could avoid prosecution on grounds that they acted to prevent an imminent attack.

Hundreds of Israelis have died in suicide bombings, shootings and other Palestinian attacks since the outbreak of the Palestinian uprising in October 2000. Israeli defense officials say the death toll would be many times higher but the vast majority of attempts are thwarted, often due to Shin Bet warnings.

The report said Palestinians under Shin Bet interrogation were routinely held in solitary confinement in foul-smelling cells, shackled to chairs for hours in a painful position, prevented from seeing lawyers or Red Cross representatives and subjected to humiliating strip searches and threats of torture.

Some detainees, apparently suspected of having information about imminent attacks, have been subjected to interrogation methods defined as torture under international law, the report says. The methods include beatings, yanking suspects forward while they are cuffed to a chair, forcing suspects to lean backward into a painful "banana" position, painful tightening of handcuffs, wrenching of the head and sleep deprivation for more than 24 hours.

About two-thirds of the detainees interviewed were subjected to abuse by the soldiers who arrested them, the report said. Although more than 500 complaints regarding abuse by Shin Bet interrogators have been filed with the state attorney's office since 2001, it has not ordered a single criminal investigation, the report said. Most cases of ill treatment by soldiers are not investigated, and only a few of those inquiries have produced indictments, according to the report.

The Justice Ministry said that the army investigated most of the complaints it had received of abuse by soldiers in 2005 and 2006.

B'Tselem called on Israel to order a halt to methods that cause bodily harm or strike at human dignity, and to back the ban with legislation. It delivered its recommendations to the Justice Ministry, Israeli lawmakers and international organizations.