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B’Tselem’s
research indicates that, since the abduction of Cpl. Gilad Shalit, on 25 June
2006, Israel has forbidden
boats, including fishing boats, to sail off the Gaza coast. The prohibition has struck a
severe blow to the fishing sector, which provides a livelihood for tens of
thousands of residents of the Gaza Strip. Lacking other means of employment,
and despite the Israeli navy’s patrol of the coast and occasional shooting at
Palestinian fishermen, some fishermen have risked their lives and violated the
prohibition.
‘Adnan
al-Badwil described the naval gunfire at his fishing boat:
Last
Wednesday [12 December], around five in the evening, I went to sea in a small,
seven-meter motorboat I own. My brother Sa’id and another fisherman who works
with us, Hamdan Barhum, were also in the boat….We threw out the nets and waited
for the fish to get caught…. After waiting about ninety minutes, I felt that
fish were in the net, and we began to lift them out of the water….Then we
started back to shore.
When we
got to about one hundred meters from shore, I heard shooting. It was about
seven o’clock and it was dark. The boat started shaking a lot, we fell into the
sea. I didn’t see where the shots came from, but I am sure it came from the
Israeli warship that was at sea. I didn’t see anything else in the water….The
boat was hit, apparently by a shell. The three of us were injured by shell
fragments…Sa’id and I were hospitalized for three days. Hamdan was very
seriously injured, so he is still in the hospital.
In
addition to shooting, in recent months Israel Navy crews have used a new method
of humiliating and abusing the fishermen. B’Tselem has learned of many cases in
which the sailors stopped fisherman off the coast, particularly opposite Rafah,
forced them to go further out to sea and then ordered them, under threat of firearms,
to undress and swim dozens of meters in the sea to the navy ship, despite the
bitter cold. The sailors threatened to shoot anyone who did not want to jump in
because he didn’t know how to swim. The fishermen were ordered to swim to a
rescue float that the soldiers threw into the water, but the soldiers yanked at
the float just before the fishermen reached it. After being taken on board, the
ship sailed to Ashdod
Port. On the way, the
fishermen were kept on deck in their soaked underwear, exposed to the wind and
the spray of water. At the port, the fishermen were held for from fourteen to
twenty-four hours, their hands cuffed and their eyes covered, and interrogated.
In some cases, they were given military clothes and were offered food and a hot
beverage. At the end of the interrogation, they were taken back to the ship and
returned to where their boat had been anchored. The sailors then forced them to
undress again and swim to their boat. In some instances, their clothes had been
blown into the sea, so they had to make their way to shore in their soaked
underwear. In rare cases, the fishermen were returned to the Gaza Strip via
Erez Crossing.
Isma’il
Basleh described what happened to him.
On Monday
[ 1 January 2007 ], I went out to sea with my brother Samir and with Aymen
al-Jabur. We were going to fish… In the distance, I saw an Israeli warship
approaching us. It stopped about thirty meters from us and fired into the air…
The captain ordered me to follow him… We went about 6.5 kilometers, and then he
ordered me to stop and turn off the motor. The captain ordered me to disconnect
the gas lines … and to take off my clothes. I stood there in my underwear. It
was very cold and there was a strong wind… The captain ordered me to swim
toward the Israeli ship, which was about twenty meters from my boat. I began to
swim, and when I got close to the ship, it moved further and further away,
until it was about one hundred meters from my boat… I told the captain “Have
mercy. I am tired,” but he told me to shut up. … The sailors threw down a
ladder and pulled me up to the deck. They shoved me onto a rough iron plank
that the sailors stand on so they don’t slip. One of the sailors blindfolded me
and bound my hands and legs from behind. He dragged me about twenty meters on
the rough iron board and then ordered me to sit on one of the cannons on deck…
In
response to B’Tselem’s inquiry to the IDF spokesperson, the IDF responded that
they restrict the fishing area off the Gaza Strip to 6 nautical miles (11
kilometers) from the coast, and that these restrictions are based on security
needs, primarily to prevent the smuggling of weapons and terrorists into and
out of the Gaza Strip, attacks from the sea in boats loaded with explosives,
and the smuggling of the captive Cpl. Gilad Shalit out of Gaza. But these
security needs do not justify the arbitrary detention and abuse of fishermen.
Firstly, the fishing boats from which the fishermen were taken did not sail far
from the Gaza
coast, and certainly did not exceed the 6 nautical mile (11 kilometer) limit at
the time that Navy patrol boats constantly patrolled the coastline. The fishing
boats were far from the Israeli Navy’s ships, and certainly didn’t pose a
threat to their security. Therefore, it seems that the detention of the
fishermen and the inhuman and degrading treatment were a means of adding to the
pressure that Israel has put on the residents of the Gaza Strip since the
abduction of Cpl. Shalit. These fishermen were detained and abused as
collective punishment of persons who breach Israel ‘s unofficial prohibition on
fishing.
In
September 2005, Israel
completed its Gaza
disengagement plan and declared the end of the military government in the Gaza
Strip. It is not clear, therefore, on what authority Israel
forbids sailing off the Gaza coast, or what is
the legal basis for detaining the fishermen, who are no longer subject,
according to Israel
‘s contention, to its control.
B’Tselem
calls on the government of Israel
to remove the unofficial prohibition on fishing off the Gaza coast, to cease detaining and abusing
fisherman, and to respect their rights, including the right to earn a living in
dignity.
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