News / Palestine

Israel arrested over 500 Palestinians in March

Monday, 10 April 2017 10:30 AM [ Last Update: Monday, 10 April 2017 10:36 AM ]

Israeli forces take position during clashes with Palestinian protesters following a weekly demonstration against the expropriation of Palestinian land by Israel in the village of Kfar Qaddum, near Nablus, in the occupied West Bank on April 7, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

Israeli forces have arrested 509 Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Jerusalem al-Quds in the last month alone.

According to a joint report by Palestinian Prisoners Club, al-Mezan Center for Human Rights, Palestinian prisoners' rights group Addameer and the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs, the figure included 75 children, 13 women and five journalists.

Most of the detentions were reported in Jerusalem al-Quds where 160 Palestinians were arrested, according to the report.

The rights groups added that the Israeli regime also issued 111 administrative detention orders in March.

The new arrests have raised the number of Palestinians held in Israeli jails to 6,500, including 300 children and 62 female prisoners.

Fresh Detentions

On Sunday, Israeli forces arrested three Palestinians during raids in the occupied Jerusalem al-Quds and the city of al-Khalil (Hebron) in the occupied West Bank.

One of the arrests was made as the Israeli troops stormed a workshop in al-Khalil, according to paltimes.net.

Regime forces also sealed the workshop and seized the machines there, claiming they were used for manufacturing weapons.

Meanwhile, an Israeli military court on Monday extended the administrative detention of Palestinian lawmaker, Hassan Yusuf, for the fourth consecutive time.

He was arrested in October 2015 during a raid on his house in Beitunia, west of the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.

Israel has imprisoned hundreds of Palestinians under the practice of administrative detention, which makes it possible to hold detainees for a period of six months - subject to indefinite renewal - without trial or charge.

The occupied territories have witnessed heightened tensions ever since Israel imposed restrictions on the entry of Palestinian worshipers into the al-Aqsa Mosque Compound in East Jerusalem al-Quds in August 2015.

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