Adalah: Press Release

UN HCHR Navi Pillay: "An Overarching Human Rights Concern is the Lack of Accountability"

Adalah briefs UN HCHR on lack of accountability for the October 2000 Killings in Israel and the War on Gaza, and home demolitions and eviction of the Arab Bedouin

(Haifa, Israel) On 11 February 2011, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (HCHR), Navi Pillay, concluded her first official visit to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). In a statement made at the conclusion of her visit, the HCHR stated that "an overarching human rights concern is the lack of accountability."

Adalah Attorney Orna Kohn participated in a meeting with the HCHR on 8 February 2011 and requested her intervention to secure accountability for the families of the 13 Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel who were killed in October 2000 by the Israeli police and security forces. Attorney Kohn presented the HCHR with Adalah's report "The Accused – Part II: Failures and Omissions by the Attorney General in Investigating the October 2000 Events". She also briefed the HCHR on the legislative attacks on Arab citizens' rights and on human rights organizations. Commending the work Israel's civil society, HCHR Pillay described the actions "aimed at curbing the freedom and effectiveness of human rights defenders" as a "troubling development."

Adalah Attorney Fatmeh El-'Ajou also met the HCHR, on 9 February 2011. She urged her to intervene to assist the Palestinian victims of the War on Gaza to obtain justice, and reviewed the state of Israeli's investigations into allegations that the Israeli military violated international law during the war, and detailed the difficulties that victims from Gaza face in submitting claims for compensation against the military to the Israeli courts. HCHR Pillay noted that the people of Gaza continued to "feel the tragic impact of Operation Cast Lead on their daily lives" and that "accountability for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the conflict remain to be addressed." The HCHR called war crimes and crimes against humanity "two of the most serious crimes," and stressed that "credible allegations that they have been committed must be properly investigated."

The HCHR also expressed deep concern regarding the crisis faced by the Arab Bedouin living in the Naqab (Negev). Two senior officials in the Office of the HCHR visited the unrecognized villages in the Naqab, where they met Arab Bedouin leaders and NGOs. Staff from Adalah's Naqab office hosted the UN Chief of the Civil Society Section, June Ray, and the UN Chief of the Middle East and North Africa Division, Frej Fenniche. Adalah called for the HCHR's urgent attention to Israel's brutal policy of home demolition and forced eviction of the Arab Bedouin from their ancestral land in the Naqab. In her statement, the HCHR stated that issue of demolitions and evacuations would be one that her office would "continue to watch closely."