GENEVA, March 8 (Reuters) – The United Nations Special Rapporteur on torture said on Friday she was investigating alleged cases of torture and degrading treatment of Palestinian detainees in Israel.
On the sidelines of a meeting of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Alice Jill Edwards said she was in discussions with the Israeli authorities to visit the country.
The detainees concerned were reportedly arrested in the occupied West Bank or the Gaza Strip since the start of the conflict between Hamas and Israel on October 7.
“I launched an investigation,” she said.
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“I call (…) Hamas, the State of Palestine, Israel, to abandon their instruments of torture, to concentrate on peace and the prospect of coexistence between neighbors in the future”, a- she added.
The Israeli diplomatic mission in Geneva confirmed that it had received a request from Alice Jill Edwards to travel to Israel, a request forwarded to Jerusalem.
She denies the allegations of torture and ill-treatment.
“Israel denies widespread and baseless allegations of mistreatment of detainees in Israeli armed forces penitentiary facilities,” the mission said in a statement.
“The mistreatment of prisoners during their detention or interrogation violates the values of the Israeli armed forces, contravenes their orders, and is therefore completely prohibited,” she adds. (Report by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber, French version by Sophie Louet, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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