HRW calls on Egypt to confirm detention of missing Palestinians

Human Rights Watch has called on Egypt to reveal the whereabouts of four Palestinian men believed to be in its custody.

The missing Palestinians were taken away by armed men 20 months ago after crossing legally from Gaza to Egypt. The four men were allegedly on their way to Turkey, two to continue their studies and the other two to receiving medical care, when six armed men in civilian clothes opened fire on the bus they were travelling in and abducted them. Since then, the men’s families have not heard from them.

If the reports about them being in Egyptian custody are true, as evidence including photographs show, then Egyptian authorities are conducting enforced disappearances by not revealing any information on the men or their whereabouts, which is a violation of international law.

A day after the abduction, Egyptian security officials and sources close to Hamas claimed that all four men were members of Hamas’ armed wing, which was confirmed by the then-Deputy Foreign Minister of Hamas, Ghazi Hamad, in September 2016.

Egyptian authorities should come clean and reveal whether these four disappeared Palestinian men from Gaza are in their custody… Twenty months without contact with the missing men inflicts incalculable anguish and suffering on their families and friends.

said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.

Since the Egyptian military’s removal of elected former President Morsi in 2013, tens of thousands of civilians and political opponents have been imprisoned. According to the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms, over 900 enforced disappearances have been committed by the police between August 2015 and August 2016.