BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- The Israeli military has shut down a program meant to decrease the number of night-time arrest raids targeting children in Palestinian homes after less than a year, with statistics suggesting that even when the program was active night raids barely decreased at all.
Military Court Watch, a Palestinian legal monitor focused on the treatment of Palestinian children in Israeli detention, said in a statement on Thursday that the Israeli military had also failed to keep any statistics on the program it implemented of its own accord, meaning no independent evaluation could be conducted.
MCW said that the evidence "indicates that no genuine attempt has been made by the military authorities to effectively replace night arrests with summonses and that the pilot program has not been implemented in good faith."
"No details of the pilot study were made public to enable an independent assessment," the statement continued, adding that the military had since conceded that no records were even kept to begin with, in effect preventing any "internal or external assessment" of what they themselves had said was a "pilot program" that was to be implemented elsewhere if successful.
"The evidence indicates that repeated night-time raids by the Israeli military is an essential element in the military's strategy of 'demonstrating presence' in Palestinian villages located near settlements amounting to a systematic pattern of intimidation." more
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