‘Men cleverer than women’
October 15, 2005Academics in the UK claim their research shows that men are more intelligent than women.
Depends on how you define cleverness.
Tags: women, health and science
Arrest them when they’re young
Fifteen-year old Ahmed was arrested at a protest against the wall in Beit Sourik on 5 June 2005. There were internationals, Israelis and Palestinians at the protest. When they were more than 500 metres away from the wall, around five Arab men began to throw stones. They were far away from the soldiers, and they were throwing the stones so as not to hit the soldiers. As they drew nearer the wall, some children began to throw stones too, encouraged by these men. Suddenly, the men pulled out guns that they’d hidden in their clothes and began arresting children. These Arabic speaking men are a part of Mustar Arabin- a special section of the Israeli Army.
Three boys, including Ahmed, were arrested and sent to the police station in Giv’at Ze’ev, where they were interrogated about stone throwing. All three boys confessed to throwing stones.
After two or three days in the police station Ahmed was sent to court to renew the arrest. A special policeman can renew the arrest for up to four days without going to court, but the court can grant a longer period of renewal. The family lawyer asked for release, and the judge believed that there was no need to hold Ahmed as he did not pose a serious threat. The prosecutor, however, went to the military appeal court, where they decided to hold Ahmed pending trial.
The prosecutor, fortunately for Ahmed, lost his file before trial. The military court has a list of the charges brought against the accused but holds no evidence relating to the trial; this is all with the prosecutor in his file. Because there was no file, an agreement was reached on the 13 July between the prosecutor and the family lawyer, for a sentence of seven weeks. If the file had been found the sentence would have been at least three months.
Ziad and Noor are fifteen-year old cousins from Beit Awwa, south of Hebron
On the 22 March 2005, on their way home from school, the cousins saw a demonstration against the wall which lies only 50 metres from their house. The soldiers attempted to disperse the demonstration by throwing tear gas canisters and by beating some demonstrators. Many of those present were arrested, including Ziad and Noor.
These two boys were beaten and intimidated during their interrogation, and were compelled to confess that they had thrown stones twice – before and also during the demonstration against the wall. They were charged with the two offences - one of throwing stones in the past and on charge of stone throwing on the day of the protest. The charges do not specify the distance between the children and the soldiers, but the charge includes the accusation that the stones were thrown to injure the soldiers near the wall.
The charges were ready on 27 March 2005. On that day the children were taken to the military court to renew their arrest, so that they could be held for longer. The prosecutor refused to reach an agreement with the children’s lawyer, in response to orders to be stricter with the cases regarding the wall. In court the first charge of throwing stones in the past was dropped, however the second charge remained. This second charge was altered though from stone throwing with a slingshot to one of just throwing stones. The maximum set penalty that a military court can give for throwing stones by hand at a stationary target is 10 years – however such sentences are rarely passed – instead if the stone throwing results in injury the charges levelled are usually boosted to attempting to kill. In cases where no injuries are caused, the usual penalty is a couple of months imprisonment. In this case the prosecutor asked the judge to sentence the children to seven months in prison. The defence lawyer requested release. The judge in this case sentenced both of the children to a three-month prison sentence and a two-month suspended sentences and demanded a 1000 NIS fine from each of the children.
An appeal hearing was held on 20 April 2005. Both defence and prosecutor made their requests. The prosecutor wanted to increase the sentence to the full seven months while the defence lawyer called for the children’s immediate release. The appeal court judge pronounced that a longer sentence of around five months would have been more appropriate as the charges were related to offences against the wall. However, he ultimately ruled against increasing the sentence on the basis that there was not a substantial difference to three and five months. In the end the judge refused both lawyers’ requests.
Fifteen-year old Abdallah is from Beit Jala near Bethlehem. He was arrested on 11 April 2005 when soldiers found him by a hole in a wire fence which runs alongside a bypass road frequently used by settlers. Abdallah was taken to Gush Etzion detention centre south of Bethlehem for interrogation. During interrogation he confessed that, when arrested, he had in his possession wire cutters, but he insisted at first that he had cut a hole in the fence to reach his dog which was on the other side. Later however, he changed his confession, admitting that he had thrown stones at Israeli cars travelling on the main highway from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. The maximum set penalty that a military court can give for throwing stones at a moving target is 20 years – indicating that the offence is considered significantly more serious than one of throwing stones at a stationary object.
Just over a week after he was arrested, Abdallah was brought to court, where an agreement was reached between the defence and the prosecutor to drop the charge of damaging the wire fence. The charge of stone throwing remained however, and Abdallah was sentenced to one and a half months in prison.
