Annual Report - Palestinian Center for Human Rights

Efforts to Prosecute Israeli War Criminals before the International
Judiciary
Denial of justice for Palestinian civilians is deeply rooted in the Israeli judicial system
in general, and the military judiciary in particular. Through it long experience, PCHR
has concluded that the Israeli judiciary is used to provide legal cover for IOF to
commit war crimes against Palestinian civilians, and that it is a means used to avoid
resorting to international justice directly under the pretext of the existence of a just
Israeli national judiciary.
In light of these facts, and following the exhaustion of national legal means (in this
case the Israeli ones), PCHR, in cooperation with a number of international legal and
human rights organizations, has resorted to international legal means to prosecute
Israeli war criminals. On 8 December 2005, the Center for Constitutional Rights and
PCHR brought a class action lawsuit before the US Judiciary in New York against
Avi Dichter, the former Director of Israel’s General Security Service (GSS), on behalf
of the Palestinians who were killed or injured in a 2002 air strike in Gaza. The attack
occurred just before midnight on July 22, 2002, when IOF dropped a one-ton bomb
on al-Daraj, a residential neighborhood in Gaza City in the Occupied Palestinian
Territory. The attack killed seven adults and eight children. In September 2005,
PCHR, acting for victims in Gaza, built a file of evidence with the help of Hickman &
Rose Solicitors to pursue a case against Major General Doron Almog (retired) in the
UK for grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention while he was GOC Southern
Commander. On 10 September 2005, the Chief London Magistrate Timothy
Workman issued a warrant to arrest Almog on suspicion of committing a grave breach
of the Fourth Geneva Convention 1949 (which is a criminal offence in the UK under
the Geneva Conventions Act 1957). The alleged offence was committed as part of
Israel’s belligerent occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territory. On 11
September 2005, Almog spent some time ‘airside’ at Heathrow airport before taking a
return flight to Israel. He had learned that he was facing arrest by British police
PCHR believes that a number of leaks occurred, which allowed Doron Almog to
evade arrest and return to Israel hours after he had landed in the UK, and asserts that it
will continue its efforts to prosecute Israeli war criminals before the international
justice. PCHR calls upon all international and regional human rights organizations to
support these efforts. PCHR followed up with the utmost concern media reports that
Israel pressured for amendment of the British laws in order to avoid the prosecution of
Israeli war criminals before the UK judiciary. 38 PCHR calls upon the UK and all
High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention not to surrender to the
Israeli pressure and to fulfil their legal and moral obligations under the Convention to
prosecute all those who are responsible for war crimes.
38 In November 2005, the Israeli daily Yediot Aharanot reported that a number of secret meetings were
held between a senior Israeli diplomatic and judicial delegation and officials of the British government
in London to abolish the arrests warrants issued against Israeli war criminals and amend the British law
related to issuing arrest warrants against war criminals. The newspaper asserted, according to senior
British sources, that the British Government intended to surrender to the Israeli pressure and amend
relevant British laws.
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