Both PA and Hamas accused of rights abuses

Palestinian security forces have been arresting and abusing journalists and activists critical of their leaders, Human Rights Watch says in a report weeks before local elections.

The US-based group says abuses have occurred in both the West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority is in power, and the Gaza Strip, run by the Islamist movement Hamas, which Israel and much of the West consider a terror group.

“Both Palestinian governments, operating independently, have apparently arrived at similar methods of harassment, intimidation and physical abuse of anyone who dares criticize them,” Sari Bashi, the organization’s Israel and Palestine director, says in a statement.

“The Palestinian people fought hard to gain the protections that accompany membership in the international community, and their leaders should take their treaty obligations seriously,” she says.

A spokesman for Palestinian Authority security forces in the West Bank, Adnan al-Damiri, says: “We are committed to the international treaties that we signed and respect for human rights.”

He says officers are trained to avoid rights abuses.

In Gaza, interior ministry spokesman Iyad al-Bozum denies torture or political arrests. He says the Human Rights Watch report “includes many fallacies.”

— AFP