RAMALLAH, West Bank — A new Human Rights Watch (HRW) report takes Palestinian leaders to task, documenting cases of systematic torture and unjustified arrests in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The report published Oct. 23 accuses the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank and its rival Hamas in the Gaza Strip of arbitrarily arresting and torturing their own and each other's citizens for mere peaceful criticism, especially on social media. Titled “Two Authorities, One Way, Zero Dissent,” the report documents that “security forces routinely taunt, threaten, beat and force detainees into painful stress positions for hours at a time.”