Adalah Challenges Prison Authorities' Ban on Education Programs for Political Prisoners
On 10 September 2002, Adalah learned from media reports that the Israeli prison authorities ordered the Open University (a correspondence school) to refuse the enrollment of all Palestinian political prisoners. This ban applies to all individuals classified by the prison system as "security prisoners," both Palestinians from the Occupied Territories and Palestinian citizens of Israel. Concerned about this recent development, Adalah sent a letter to the prison authorities and to Attorney General Elyakim Rubenstein asking that the order be rescinded. The order prevents the university from registering political prisoners in a number of educational programs, including Humanities, Computer Sciences, Physics, Chemistry, Political Science, and International Relations.
In the letter, Adalah Staff Attorney Orna Kohn wrote that the order violates The Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty (1992), in particular, the right to dignity, which includes the rights to education and freedom of speech. In addition, she emphasized that there is no connection between maintaining security in prison and the enrollment of political prisoners in academic courses.
