הוועד הציבורי נגד עינויים בישראל

Subsequent to the petition submitted by five human rights organizations led by the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), the High Court of Justice today clearly stated that it is forbidden to use threats, false promises and charades that relate to family members of interrogees as a form of pressure in General Security Service (GSS) and police interrogations. The Justices, in addition, expressed their shock at the testimonies of interrogees stating that severe psychological pressure was used against them when they were forced into making a cruel and impossible choice between confession to an offence, that they may or may not have committed, and possible harm to the well being of family members by means of their arrest, continued detention etc.

In response to the petition, the State's representative, Attorney Aner Helman, stated that the GSS has revised and clarified the prohibitions concerning this issue. However, even in the one case where the GSS admitted that it exploited family members illegally, no measures were taken against the interrogators involved, a fact that caused the Justices great dissatisfaction.

The Justices, Dorit Beinish, Edna Arbel and Saleem Jubaran welcomed the State's report concerning the clarification of the directives given to GSS interrogators but did not demand to see them or to monitor their implementation. In spite of the above the Court decided to reject the petition while noting the fact that due to it the directives had been clarified.

The petition was filed in April 2008 by the Public Committee against Torture in  Israel (PCATI), Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR), B'Tselem, Hamoked: Center for the Defence of the Individual and Adalah against the GSS, the Israel Police and the Attorney General. The organizations, represented by Attorneys Smadar Ben-Natan and Bana Shoughry Badarne, head of PCATI's Legal Department, emphasized that the exploitation of family members during police and GSS interrogations, as demonstrated by the cases described in the petition, causes severe emotional pressure, tantamount to psychological torture, not only to the detainee himself but also to members of his family who, without their knowledge or free consent, have been turned into an instrument in the interrogation of their loved one. The organizations, therefore, demanded that the Court order the GSS and the police to cease the use of these methods.

The petition is based on a series of events detailed in the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) report, “Family Matters, Using Family Members to Pressure Detainees Under GSS Interrogation” that was published in April 2008 and discussed in the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee as well as on additional cases including that of an East Jerusalem minor who was arrested on suspicion of participating in disturbances in the city. As a form of pressure on the minor, the police threatened to arrest his father and, later on, brought his mother into the interrogation room and presented her, handcuffed, before the detainee, in a pretense that she was arrested. In the discussion held at the Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee, the Head of the GSS Interrogations Unit admitted that, at least in one case, family members were exploited in the above manner. In this case, involving the Sweiti family, the father and wife of a detainee were brought to an interrogation facility and presented to their loved one as if they also had been arrested. A short time afterwards, the interrogee, Mahmud Sweiti, attempted to commit suicide. The GSS agent stated at the in the Knesset that, following the complaint filed by PCATI on this matter, the directives have been changed so that “in general”, this form of pretense will not be allowed yet the GSS refrained from clearly promising that it would no longer use family members as a form of pressure in interrogation. This, together with the fact that complaints against GSS interrogators are examined by a GSS officer and always closed without the initiation of a criminal investigation, makes it clear that it is necessary to establish an external, independent investigative body that will monitor the actions of the General Security Service (GSS).