On Thursday, 22 June 2023, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) has released its 26th annual report on human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian Territory (oPt). The report covers the period from 01 January to 31 December 2022.

The annual report comes in two parts; the first is a comprehensive and detailed description of the human right violations in the oPt, including the Israeli Occupation Forces’ (IOF) war crimes and violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law throughout the year, as well as PA’s human rights violations and obstacles to democratic reform within its competence and powers.

The second part illustrates PCHR’s program activities from 01 January to 31 December 2022, including PCHR’s legal aid for victims of human rights violations, amongst them women victims of violence, as well as local and international advocacy activities to strengthen cooperation and coordination with human rights organizations and Palestinian civil society organizations (CSOs); PCHR’s participation in international conferences and meetings, and meetings with visiting delegations, prominent figures and others on Zoom.

In 2022, IOF continued to commit willful killings against Palestinian civilians that have significantly escalated in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, due to increasing daily incursions into Palestinian cities, villages and camps, and carrying out assassinations and summary executions. IOF have accelerated steps towards creating facts on the ground to perpetuate the Apartheid regime against the Palestinian people, and to withhold any possibility for the Palestinians to have their inalienable right to self-determination and end the occupation. The Israeli occupation continued to annex lands from the occupied Palestinian territory in favor of settlement expansion in the West Bank, including Jerusalem, aiming to fragment the Palestinian geography via settlement projects, the annexation wall and military checkpoints. Moreover, settlers’ attacks, protected by IOF, escalated against Palestinian civilians and their property, including crimes of shooting, killing and wounding Palestinian civilians, and the leveling and uprooting of Palestinian lands and crops. Additionally, house demolitions increased in the West Bank on grounds of IOF’s collective punishment policy and under the pretext of unlicensed construction in Area (C), as well as in the occupied city of Jerusalem to expel Palestinians and Judaize the City by creating a Jewish majority. The Israeli authorities also continued to target Palestinian CSOs, including human rights organizations, and carry out smear campaigns to undermine their credibility and suspend funding to these organizations.

In the Gaza Strip, beside the Israeli illegal and inhuman 16-year closure imposed there, the ensuing catastrophic effects on economic and social rights and restrictions on civilians’ freedom of movement, the willful killings of Palestinian civilians and destruction of their property continued. This year, the Gaza Strip went through a new Israeli aggression that lasted for several days during which IOF targeted various areas of the Strip, inflicting dozens of killings and injuries, destroying hundreds of homes and civilian objects, and causing extensive destruction to the infrastructure and vital facilities.

The report documented the killing of (187) Palestinians, including 137 civilians, amongst them 41 children and 7 women. Among the deaths, 155 were killed in the West Bank, including 118 civilians, amongst them 33 children and 4 women, while 32 were killed in the Gaza Strip, including 19 civilians, amongst them 8 children and 3 women.

The report highlighted the continued suffering of Palestinians as a result of Israeli-imposed closure policy, especially in the Gaza Strip where IOF has imposed a 16-year illegal and inhuman closure and tightened it during aggressions on Gaza, including banning the entry of all goods, including the basic needs, into the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile in the West Bank, the restrictions on freedom of movement continued as IOF established military checkpoints to cut off Palestinian cities, villages and refugee camps and imposed restrictions on travelling abroad. Also, the restrictions imposed on the occupied city of Jerusalem increased, including restrictions on the entry of Al-Aqsa Mosque.

The report also documented that the Israeli authorities continued to detain about 4,600 detainees in their prisons in inhumane conditions, including 160 children and 34 women. Among these detainees, 600 are patients with serious and chronic diseases subjected to different forms of torture. Detainees are also subjected to medical negligence policy, leading to the death of two detainees, including a woman, after the Israeli authorities rejected all appeals for their release. Moreover, administrative detentions escalated this year, as the authorities issued 2134 arrest warrants for Palestinians in the West Bank.

The report underscores IOF’s ongoing demolition policy against civilian property as dozens of civilian objects were targeted and destroyed during IOF’s aggression on the Gaza Strip in August 2022. Moreover, the Israeli authorities perpetuated this policy in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, where Palestinian property and civilian objects were demolished as part of their settlement expansion plans, land confiscations and complete Judaization of the occupied City.

The Israeli settlement crimes and settlers’ attacks unprecedently escalated in the West Bank, including occupied Jerusalem, where licenses were issued to construct 12,934 settlement units while 318 Palestinian houses and 583 facilities were destroyed by IOF.

Moreover, the campaign against the Palestinian society continued aiming to eradicate it as 7 Palestinian NGOs were closed in Ramallah after IOF raided them and confiscated some of their contents. Meanwhile, smear campaigns continued as well by the Israeli official bodies and Jewish rightist organizations aiming at delegitimizing and undermining the credibility of the Palestinian civil society organizations and their role in strengthening and developing the Palestinian community.

The report also highlighted the continuous violations against journalists, amongst them physical assaults that included killings, injuries, beatings, detentions and coverage and photography bans. The most prominent example of these attacks was the killing of journalist Shireen Abu ‘Akleh, Al-Jazeera Reporter, by an Israeli sniper.

The report also criticized the performance of the new Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Mr. Karim Khan, who has not taken any step in the investigation that was opened in March 2021 into the situation of Palestine despite the war crimes committed by the Israeli authorities.

At the Palestinian Internal level, the political division continued within the Palestinian Authority affecting all life aspects of Palestinians. 2022 ended and the Palestinians did not hold general elections (legislative and presidential) since the last legislative elections were held in 2006. The division parties since then have practiced their legislative powers each in their controlled area, as the President issues laws by decree in the West Bank, while the Change and Reform Bloc practices legislations in the Gaza Strip on behalf of the Legislative Council.

Therefore, the division in the legislative and judicial authorities continued affecting all human rights in the oPt, where the Palestinian security services in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip arbitrarily arrested, summoned and detained Palestinians without due process of law and procedural laws and in violation of Palestine’s contractual obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Convention against Torture.

The restrictions continued on the freedom of opinion and expression in Palestine maintaining stable status of deterrence triggered by the constant suppression of freedom of expression, which has escalated since the Palestinian political division in 2007.

This year witnessed further restrictions on the right to freedom of association, including the amendment to the non-profit companies’ regulation upon a decision issued by the Palestinian Cabinet, which imposed excessive restrictions on the work and funding of non-profit companies, under the pretext of fighting terrorism.

Death sentences continued to be issued and executed in the Gaza Strip, as this year witnessed serious developments regarding death penalty in the Gaza Strip. Five death sentences were executed in the Gaza Strip after a cease of executions since 2017. Also, this year witnessed an unprecedented rise on the number of new death sentences issued (not upholding previous sentences) since the establishment of the PA, recording 27 new death sentences.

PCHR’s Annual Report is issued in Arabic and English, and it is distributed nationally and internationally to civil society organizations, national and international human rights organizations, official and governmental bodies, diplomatic missions and representative offices, United Nations bodies, journalists and media.