I stand with Israel.
I believe it has the right to exist and to defend itself against its enemies. If nothing else, the past year has reminded us how many people — in the Middle East and around the world — want it to disappear.
Credit: KYLE KIELINSKI
Credit: KYLE KIELINSKI
Although I oppose its settlements in the West Bank, I do not believe Israel is an evil or apartheid state. Nor do I believe it is guilty of genocide in Gaza, although I think its response to the Hamas attack last October has been disproportionate to what Israel suffered.
But I also think it is committing war crimes within its own borders.
I’m talking about the Israeli prisons where Palestinians are tortured, beaten and humiliated. If you stand with Israel, like I do, you should stand up against these practices. They make a mockery of everything it stands for.
It isn’t just that torture violates international law. It also runs counter to the Jewish tradition, which teaches us that every human being is created in God’s image and must be treated with dignity and decency.
Palestinian prisoners are not treated that way. Anyone who thinks otherwise should read the report published in August by the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, which translates to “in the image of God.”
Its report is called “Welcome to Hell.”
Prisoners described sleep deprivation, withdrawal of food and physical abuse with wooden clubs, brass knuckles and tasers.
One inmate was stripped and searched with a hand-held metal detector. “They started hitting us on our private parts with the detector,” he said. “Then they ordered us to salute the Israeli flag that was hanging on the wall.”
That speaks to an awful truth: Torture is sponsored by the Israeli state. It’s not the work of a few bad actors. It’s official policy.
As the longtime human rights activist Aryeh Neier recently wrote, most torture in the world occurs in solitary or semisecret circumstances. Victims are singled out and abused in police facilities until they provide enough information — whether true or false — to make their tormentors stop. Then they are transferred to prisons.
Not in Israel, where the torture happens in plain sight. Some victims were abused in front of other prisoners, who were forced to lift their heads — and open their eyes — to watch. Others were tortured in the presence of Israeli visitors.
And nobody seemed interested in extracting information from the inmates. The point is simply to inflict pain upon them.
To its credit, Israel detained nine soldiers earlier this year on charges of sexually abusing a prisoner. But the episode also sparked protest by far-right nationalists, who forced their way into the prison and demanded the soldiers’ release.
Asked whether it was OK to place foreign objects in prisoners’ rectums — another horror that happens in Israeli prisons — one member of Parliament said yes. “Everything is legitimate to do! Everything!” he replied.
That shows how far a subset of Israelis have descended into cruelty and sadism. Once you have imagined your enemy as less than human, you can do anything — and everything — to him.
Some critics of Israel surely received this news as proof of its inherent depravity: Of course Israel abuses Palestinian prisoners; after all, it is a racist project based on Jewish supremacy.
That’s cynical. It ignores protests by B’Tselem and other Israelis against torture as well as the country’s long history of judicial decisions prohibiting it. “Although a democracy must sometimes fight with one hand tied behind its back, it nonetheless has the upper hand,” the Israeli Supreme Court famously ruled in 1999, rejecting the use of physical force in interrogations.
Meanwhile, I expect that some of Israel’s supporters will read this column as yet another attack on it. If you back Israel, why would you blast its mistreatment of prisoners? Doesn’t that simply play into the hands of its enemies?
That’s cynical, too. People who believe in Israel should be the first ones to raise their voices when it flouts its own laws and principles. Turning a blind eye to the abuse doesn’t help Israel; to the contrary, it confirms the worst claims of its foes. It gives them the upper hand.
Last Saturday was Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement, when we fast and reflect on our wrongdoing. I spent the day thinking about the wrongs in Israeli prisons and hoping we can make them right.
Again, Israel has every right to defend itself against those who wish to destroy it. But it has no right — none — to torture anyone. I’m sad that I have to say that. But I’m even sadder that some of its defenders won’t.
Jonathan Zimmerman teaches education and history at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of “Free Speech and Why You Should Give a Damn” and eight other books.
About the Author
