THE STATE SECURITY COURTS

The state security courts are the most disturbing feature of the Palestinian judicial system and illustrate the PA's willingness to flout fundamental international human rights norms. These courts, which stand outside the Palestinian civil and military court system, were established pursuant to a decree issued by President Arafat on February 7, 1995, under pressure from the United States and Israel to respond more firmly to anti-Israeli violence. The decree provides the courts with jurisdiction "over crimes which infringe on internal and external state security and over the felonies and misdemeanors mentioned in Order 555 of 1957."48

The first trial before a state security court took place on April 9, 1995. The catalyst seemed to be the explosion of two bombs inside Israel only hours earlier; such attacks invariably have prompted demands from Israel that the PA do more to prevent anti-Israel violence. By February 1997, an estimated fifty-seven additional cases had been brought before the courts. Trials have usually been held at night, within hours of arrest, and have often lasted only minutes. Defendants have been systematically denied the right to be represented by independent counsel, bringwitnesses, or appeal their verdicts. The judges presiding over these courts are military commanders who reportedly have no judicial experience, having served in neither the ordinary criminal nor the military courts.49

When the courts were first established, Justice Minister Freih Abu Medein vowed that the proceedings would be open to the public and the media.50 However, virtually all trials have been held in secret and closed to the public, including relatives of defendants. For example, Muhammad Simri was tried by the Gaza state security court on April 17, 1995, and sentenced to seven years for transporting explosives and harmful substances into Israel. His father, Hassan, stated that neither he nor his son's lawyer knew anything about Muhammad's trial until neighbors heard about it on the radio.51 Members of an Amnesty International delegation visiting Gaza in May 1995 were barred from attending state security court sessions and denied access to charge sheets and trial transcripts.52

Although the decree establishing the state security courts limits their jurisdiction to state security matters, they have tried and convicted people on charges such as libel, homicide, and selling rotten food. President Arafat has, in some cases, transferred civil or criminal cases to these courts, thereby undermining the civil and criminal court system.

The case of Yusif and Shaher al-Rai, cousins from Qalqiliya, illustrates the dangers posed by the speedy trials that have come to characterize these courts. In August 1996, according to Palestinian human rights organizations, Israel asked the PA to arrest the al-Rai cousins after Jamal al-Hindi, a Palestinian in Israeli detention, named the two as accomplices in the July 1995 murder of two Israelis. The PA immediately charged the two with distributing leaflets and incitement against the Israeli-PLO peace process and brought them before the state security court. In an interview in prison, the two men told Human Rights Watch that they were tried by the state security court at about 2:00 p.m. on September 3, 1995, in a single proceeding that lasted between ten and fifteen minutes. They were never questioned or interrogated during the ten or eleven days that they spent in detention prior to the trial. They were represented by a court-appointed lawyer with whom they had no chance to speak before the trial. According to Shaher, "One time I tried to say something but the prosecutor said, `You have a lawyer. Let him talk.'"53 The two were sentenced to seven years imprisonment and hard labor.

After ninety days of interrogation, Israel released al-Hindi and cleared him of charges related to the murder. Al-Hindi later claimed to have framed the al-Rai cousins because he had been tortured.54 According to Shaher's wife Manal, "After Jamal was proven innocent the PA repeatedly promised to release Shaher and Yusif as well. But almost a year passed and nothing was done."55 Yusif and Shaher al-Rai initiated two hunger strikes to protest their sentences, first on July 5, 1996 and more recently from February 21 through March 4, 1997, along with five otherprisoners sentenced by the state security court in Jericho. Among their demands were a fair trial and to be moved to prisons closer to their homes, according to the Addameer Prisoners Support Association.