[News] Israeli forces raid and seal shut DCIP office - "Sealing and closing our office will not silence us"

[Anti-Imperialist News]

dci-palestine.org
<https://www.dci-palestine.org/israeli_forces_raid_and_seal_shut_dcip_office_leaving_official_notice_declaring_organization_unlawful?utm_campaign=2022_office_raid_us&utm_medium=email&utm_source=dcipalestine>
Israeli forces raid and seal shut DCIP office, leaving official notice
declaring organization unlawful
*Ramallah, August 18, 2022—*Israeli forces raided Defense for Children
International - Palestine’s headquarters in the central occupied West Bank
early Thursday morning.

Israeli forces raided DCIP’s headquarters located in Al-Bireh’s Sateh
Marhaba neighborhood, located just south of Ramallah around 5:55 a.m. on
August 18. More than a dozen Israeli soldiers forced open the office’s
locked front door and removed a computer, photocopier, printer, and client
files related to Palestinian child detainees represented by DCIP’s lawyers
in Israel’s military courts, CCTV footage showed. They exited the office
after 45 minutes, welding shut the entry door and leaving a notice taped to
the door ordering the office closed declaring DCIP an illegal organization.
It is unclear exactly what items were confiscated.

“Our human rights documentation and evidence-based advocacy exposing
Israeli forces’ grave violations against Palestinian children has made us a
target of the Israeli government for years,” said Khaled Quzmar, General
Director at DCIP. “Sealing and closing our office will not silence us. We
reject the Israeli designation and any repressive tactics aimed at
eliminating our work and urge the international community to robustly
denounce this serious escalation against Palestinian human rights
defenders.”

Video surveillance footage from inside the DCIP office shows Israeli forces
entering the premises at 5:55 a.m. The Israeli soldiers move through the
DCIP office inspecting, gathering, and removing random items and files, and
then they exit at 6:40 a.m. They welded the door shut and taped a military
order to the door effectively closing the DCIP office.

The raid on the DCIP office was part of a series of early morning raids
against the six prominent Palestinian human rights and civil society
organizations criminalized by Israeli authorities in October 2021,
including Addameer, Al-Haq, DCIP, the Union of Agricultural Work
Committees, the Bisan Center for Research and Development, and the Union of
Palestinian Women Committees. The groups work directly with Palestinian
women and girls, children, peasant families, prisoners, and civil society
activists, providing direct services and monitoring and exposing human
rights abuses.

Israeli Minister of Defense, Benny Gantz, designated the six Palestinian
human rights and civil society groups as “terrorist organizations” on
October 19, 2021, pursuant to a 2016 Israeli law, a designation that
effectively criminalizes the activities of these organizations and
authorizes Israeli authorities to close their offices, seize their assets,
and arrest and jail their staff members.

In July, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the
Netherlands, Spain and Sweden released a joint statement
<https://www.government.nl/documents/diplomatic-statements/2022/07/12/joint-statement-on-the-israeli-designation-of-palestinian-civil-society-organisations-as-terrorist-organisations>
on the Israeli designations stating that “no substantial information was
received from Israel that would justify reviewing our policy towards the
six Palestinian NGOs on the basis of the Israeli decision to designate
these NGOs as 'terrorist organizations.” The nine countries declared, “in
the absence of such evidence, we will continue our cooperation and strong
support for the civil society in the oPT.”

On July 18, U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) and 21 other members of
Congress sent a letter
<https://pressley.house.gov/sites/pressley.house.gov/files/2022%2007%2018%20Sec%20Blinken%20Dir%20Haines%20Palestinian%20NGO%20Letter%20Rep%20Pressley%20vF.pdf>
to Biden administration officials demanding action on behalf of six
prominent Palestinian human rights organizations designated as “terrorist”
groups by Israeli authorities. The letter, addressed to Secretary of State
Antony J. Blinken and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, calls
on the Biden administration to publicly reject the Israeli designation,
urge the Israeli government to reverse its decision, and confirm a date for
an inter-agency briefing and provide a report to Congress within 30 days.

In February, DCIP joined other leading Palestinian human rights and civil
society organizations to file a procedural objection
<https://www.dci-palestine.org/dcip_demands_israeli_military_cancel_declaration_as_unlawful_association>
to the decision by Israeli military authorities declaring DCIP and other
groups “unlawful associations.”

The objection demands the immediate cancelation of an Israeli military
order declaring DCIP and other leading Palestinian human rights and civil
society groups “unlawful associations” pursuant to the 1945 Emergency
(Defense) Regulations. It emphasizes that the Israeli authorities’
declaration amounts to a blatant and serious violation of international
law, including denial of due process and fair trial guarantees by relying
on alleged “secret evidence” in Israeli military courts that are neither
independent nor impartial.

Government and United Nations officials, including human rights experts
<https://www.dci-palestine.org/un_experts_condemn_israeli_military_raid_on_dcip>,
have condemned the designation and called upon Israeli authorities to
reverse the designation immediately and cease efforts to criminalize human
rights work. Many solidarity statements have been issued by trade unions,
academics, editorial boards, human rights and development organizations,
celebrities and artists, and individuals.

Israeli paramilitary border police forces previously raided
<https://www.dci-palestine.org/israeli_forces_raid_dcip_office_confiscate_computers_and_client_files>
DCIP’s headquarters on July 29, 2021. More than a dozen Israeli soldiers
forced open the office’s locked front door and confiscated six desktop
computers, two laptops, hard drives, and client files related to
Palestinian child detainees represented by DCIP’s lawyers in Israel’s
military courts. No documents were left in the office to give any
indication of the reason for the raid, and they did not leave behind any
receipt of materials seized.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20220818/a68ef85e/attachment.htm>