<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?><oembed><version><![CDATA[1.0]]></version><provider_name><![CDATA[Occupied Palestine | فلسطين]]></provider_name><provider_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com]]></provider_url><author_name><![CDATA[occupiedpalestine]]></author_name><author_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/author/hajarhajar/]]></author_url><title><![CDATA[Leaked cable suggests PA hid torture&nbsp;death]]></title><type><![CDATA[link]]></type><html><![CDATA[<p><img src="https://i0.wp.com/www.maannews.net/images/PhotoViewer/121156.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<div style="text-align:left;margin-top:10px;"><strong>Maan News Agency | Sept 7, 2011 | By Jared Malsin</strong></div>
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<p>NEW YORK (Ma&#8217;an) &#8212; Palestinian security officials privately offered American diplomats candid details about the 2009 death of a detainee while they publicly refuted allegations of torture, according to a US diplomatic cable recently released by WikiLeaks.</p>
<p>Suspected Hamas member Haitham Amr, a nurse at a Hebron hospital, died less than a week after the PA’s General Intelligence division arrested him in June 2009.</p>
<p>Security officials claimed publicly that Amr fell to his death trying to escape through a second-story window. But the <a href="http://www.cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=09JERUSALEM1030&amp;" target="_blank">recently released cable</a>, part of a full batch posted online in late August, reveals that General Intelligence officials told the US Consulate in Jerusalem that their initial account was &#8220;simply wrong.&#8221;</p>
<p>Corroborating allegations of torture from the victim’s family and human rights groups, the cable says the PA’s own investigation found evidence that Amr was abused before his death.</p>
<p>Those findings seem to correspond with the results of an official autopsy, witness reports and <a href="http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/02/16/palestinian-authority-no-justice-torture-death-custody" target="_blank">investigations by human rights groups</a> that Amr died under torture by his Palestinian captors. Amr&#8217;s body showed signs of severe abuse like electric shocks and cigarette burns, his father insisted at the time.</p>
<p>The cable also shows that senior PA figures as well as American officials were made aware almost immediately of the circumstances of Amr&#8217;s death, but they never shared that information in public.</p>
<p>Multiple &#8220;mid- and high-level&#8221; General Intelligence officials told the consulate that investigators had &#8220;confirmed that bruises and other signs of abuse were observed on Amre&#8217;s body prior to his burial,&#8221; the document says.</p>
<p>&#8220;While the investigation continues, GI officials said they now expect to conclude that Amre&#8217;s death resulted from maltreatment,&#8221; according to the cable, marked &#8220;secret&#8221; and dated three days after the incident.</p>
<p>The PA never retracted its initial account, although Interior Minister Said Abu Ali <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/05/fatah-hamas-torture-trial" target="_blank">conceded</a> in October 2009 that there had been a &#8220;violation of the rights&#8221; of Haitham Amr.</p>
<p>Rights campaigners say the new information casts doubt on the credibility of a special military court which acquitted five officers who were charged in connection with Amr&#8217;s death.</p>
<p>The cable seems to confirm that the court &#8220;ignored not only the testimony of prisoners who saw Amr die, but also information from the GI itself,&#8221; Human Rights Watch researcher Bill Van Esveld said Monday.</p>
<p>Esveld told Ma&#8217;an that &#8220;Until today, Haitham Amr&#8217;s family has been denied justice for his death, and the result in his case is typical&#8221; and indicative of widespread reports of human rights abuses.</p>
<p>The 2010 verdict ordered the General Intelligence officers to pay compensation to the victim&#8217;s family, which rejected both the ruling and the money. Another officer, identified by witnesses, was never charged.</p>
<p>No PA security official has ever been criminally convicted of abusing persons in custody &#8220;despite hundreds of documented complaints of torture and other abuse,&#8221; Esveld says. &#8220;Given these serious and widespread abuses, the US should stop funding PA security agencies until the PA ends this record of impunity.&#8221;</p>
<p>In 2010, the US provided $350 million to the PA for its security forces in addition to $150 million in direct budgetary aid, according to Human Rights Watch.</p>
<p>US government officials have consistently denied that American funds support security agencies accused of torture; they say most aid goes to the PA&#8217;s National Security Forces.</p>
<p>News reports suggest otherwise. In December 2009, The Guardian <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/17/cia-palestinian-security-agents" target="_blank">quoted Western officials</a> saying that the CIA works so closely with the General Intelligence and the Preventive Security organization that the Americans seem to be supervising the Palestinians&#8217; work.</p>
<p>Former negotiator Yezid Sayigh, an expert on the Palestinian security sector, has also <a href="http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/security_sector_reform.pdf" target="blank">reported</a> that the US and UK have been providing funding and training to the General Intelligence since the mid-1990s.</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=418136">Source</a></p>
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