The United Nations expert on torture told Reuters today that she was investigating allegations of torture and mistreatment of Palestinians detained in Israel.
In an exchange with Reuters during a meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, Dr. Alice Jill Edwards said she had recently received allegations concerning Palestinians who were being held in the Israeli-occupied West Bank or detained because of the conflict in Gaza.
“I’m looking into that as we speak and carrying out a fact-finding investigation,” said Edwards, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
“I’m calling on … Hamas, the state of Palestine, Israel to put their torture tools down, to really have a focus on peace and a prospect of living side-by-side as neighbors in the future,” she added, according to a Reuters report on the exchange.
Israel’s military has insisted that its military operations in the Gaza Strip are intended to dismantle Hamas and rescue hostages who were kidnapped by Hamas attackers in southern Israel on Oct. 7. Hamas, the militant group that rules Gaza, is considered a terror organization by the U.S. and the U.K.
