B'Tselem Welcomes Arrest of Border Policemen Suspected of Killing 'Imran Abu Hamdia

18 April 2003

B'Tselem urges Border Police commander to act firmly to end abuse by Border Policemen

B'Tselem welcomes the arrest of four Border Policemen suspected of beating to death 'Imran Abu Hamdia, 18, in Hebron in December 2002. The Department for the Investigation of Police (DIP), of the Ministry of Justice, investigated the incident after B'Tselem provided its findings to DIP and requested that it open an investigation into the matter.

B'Tselem urges DIP to investigate the many complaints of abuse that B'Tselem has filed with it regarding Border Police abuse throughout the Occupied Territories, in general, and in Hebron, in particular.

B'Tselem urges the commander of the Border Police to act firmly to put an end to the abuse of Palestinians by Border Police in the Occupied Territories.

Background

Around 8:00 P.M. on 30 December 2002, a Border Police jeep stopped alongside Abu Hamdia, who was standing with friends outside his home in Hebron. According to testimonies given to B'Tselem, the Border Policemen put Abu Hamdia into the jeep and left. A few of Abu Hamdia's friends went to Hebron's industrial area, which is known as a place where Border Policemen take residents and beat them up. About forty minutes after Abu Hamdia was taken, his friends found his body lying in the industrial zone, alongside the road.

B'Tselem began its investigation that evening. Among its findings, the organization found that Border Policemen had also severely beaten two other Palestinian residents of Hebron the same evening. After taking the initial testimonies, B'Tselem demanded DIP to open an investigation. B'Tselem assisted DIP in locating the witnesses and getting them to the DIP investigators so they could give their statements. B'Tselem and the Palestinian human rights organization al-Haq obtained the consent of Abu Hamdia's family to open the grave and remove his body, and arranged that Danish pathologist Dr. Jurgen Tomassen participate in conducting the autopsy. The autopsy revealed that Abu Hamdia had been severely beaten before he died.

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