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Israeli military court postpones sentencing of Palestinian minors

February 15, 2014 at 1:27 pm

The Israeli occupation is to charge five Palestinian minors whom it claims are responsible for causing a car accident that resulted in the injury to several Israeli settlers in Salfeet.

The Centre for Palestinian Prisoners (CPP) said in a statement issued on Tuesday that the hearing was planned to be held today (Tuesday), but for unknown reasons, it was postponed.


The CPP lawyer, Kamal Sabbagh, said that an Israeli military court postponed the hearing session of the five Palestinians for an extra ten days. “No reasons were given by the court,” the lawyer said.

The minors are Mohamed Kolaib, 15, Mohamed Solaiman, 14, Mohamed al-Souf, 15, Tamer al-Souf, 16, and Ammar al-Souf, 17.

Based on accusations against them, the lawyer warned that the minors could be given long sentences.

He said that the Israeli occupation accuses them of throwing stones at settlers’ cars. Their stones, the Israeli occupation claimed, caused a car accident in which eight settlers were wounded. Some of them sustained serious injuries.

The West Bank human rights activist, Qaher abu-Kamal, called on international human rights organisations active in issues relating to minors to offer their legal support. He said that the Israeli occupation had tortured them until they confessed to the charges against them.

Urging international organisations to help, Abu-Kamal said that there were several precedents in Israeli courts for convicting Palestinian minors regardless of the norms of international law.

Israeli occupation forces have recently detained more than 20 Palestinian minors from their schools and off the streets while on their way to school.

An Israeli human rights centre published a video showing how aggressive Israeli soldiers are when they arrest some children off the streets of Hebron. The children shown are wearing their school uniforms and carrying schools bags on their backs.