Torture : quarterly journal on rehabilitation of torture victims and prevention of torture最新文献

Introduction: This paper examines Israel's deliberate use of starvation and deprivation against Palestinian children in Gaza since 7 October 2023, arguing these are not collateral effects but a systematic, discriminatory strategy. By impeding food, water and medical care and destroying civilian infrastructure, the conduct meets thresholds for starvation as a method of warfare, torture, and genocide.

Materials and methods: We conducted detailed interviews using a semi-structured protocol (Defense for Children International-Palestine, 2024) triangulated with secondary human-rights reporting and legal data.

Results: Evidence shows coordinated, prolonged obstruction of humanitarian aid and destruction of agricultural land, water systems, and medical infrastructure, producing catastrophic child malnutrition and documented deaths from starvation and disease. Where these practices are intentional and pursued with knowledge of their effects, they constitute torture under international law. The discriminatory impact on Palestinian civilians, especially children, supports an inference of genocidal intent and grounds state responsibility and universal jurisdiction.

Conclusions: Israel's starvation policy toward children in Gaza qualifies as torture and amounts to genocide. The paper urges recognition of starvation as torture under jus cogens, immediate unimpeded humanitarian access, and prompt criminal investigations. States must enforce obligations under CAT, the Geneva Conventions, and the Rome Statute to protect Palestinian children's rights and dignity.

The report A/HRC/58/55 entitled Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment: hostage-taking as torture, prepared by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Jill Edwards, was submitted to the Human Rights Council in its fifty-eighth session[1] (24 February-4 April 2025). The report addresses the phenomenon of hostage-taking through the lens of the absolute prohibition of torture. It aims to reinforce international legal frameworks, raise awareness of the psychological and physical harms associated with hostage-taking, and provide recommendations for States, non-State actors, and international bodies (Edwards, 2025). [1] Edwards, A. J. (2025). Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment: hostage-taking as torture (A/HRC/58/55). United Nations Human Rights Council. https://www.ohchr.org.

Introduction: This article examines the violations of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) concerning Israeli attacks on medical personnel and facilities in Lebanon between September 23rd and October 23rd, 2024.

Methods: Based on data from the Lebanese Center for Human Rights (CLDH), the study highlights attacks on medical units, personnel, and humanitarian organisations.

Results: The study documents more than 250 attacks on hospitals, ambulances and medical personnel, paramedics and patients.

Discussion: The results are compared with available data from the World Health Organisation, the Ministry of Public Health and INGOs.

Conclusions: The findings indicate severe and repeated breaches of IHL, particularly under the Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols. This study emphasises the urgent need for accountability and the enforcement of international legal frameworks to safeguard medical neutrality in conflict zones.

This article explores the psychopolitical logic of torture within the Palestinian context, focusing on its role as a tool of domination and resistance. Torture in Palestine is not merely an instrument for inflicting individual suffering but is a strategic mechanism employed by the Israeli state to dismantle collective identity, suppress resistance, and erode the dignity of the Palestinian people. Since the onset of the Gaza war on October 7, 2023, the scale and brutality of torture tactics, including physical abuse, psychological manipulation, and sexual violence, have intensified, highlighting the urgent need for documentation and accountability. This article examines recurring patterns in testimonies of Palestinian detainees, focusing on the psychological and symbolic dimensions of state violence. These practices reflect a broader political and ethical crisis, requiring the involvement of mental health professionals in documenting the psychological consequences of torture. Traditional psychiatric frameworks are insufficient in addressing the realities of state-sanctioned violence; thus, a critical human rights-based approach is advocated. This approach emphasises the need for a decolonial, justice-oriented mental health praxis that supports collective resilience and political agency. By documenting torture (i.e. applying the Istanbul Protocol or by other means), this article argues, healthcare professionals can empower survivors to reclaim agency over their narratives and contribute to the pursuit of justice and redress. The article concludes by calling for global solidarity, not only through adherence to international humanitarian law but through active political action to hold perpetrators accountable and protect the human rights of Palestinians.

For the tenth consecutive year, the Southwest Asia and North Africa (SWANA) region remains the least peaceful region in the world[1] due to extreme geopolitical instability, war, and natural disasters. This ongoing turmoil has caused an exacerbation of mental health challenges (Okasha et al., 2024) which, if left unaddressed, will present the biggest barrier to the reintroduction of stability and the rebuilding of societies. [1] Global Peace Index 2025.

Introduction: This study examines how Israeli domestic legislation, military orders, and judicial practices governing the arrest and detention of Palestinians-intensified after 7 October 2023-operate as a system of discriminatory control across the occupied Palestinian territory and within Israel. It situates recent amendments within international humanitarian and human rights law and the International Court of Justice's 19 July 2024 advisory conclusions on the unlawfulness of Israel's continued presence and the breach of Palestinian self-determination.

Materials and methods: A qualitative legal analysis was conducted of military orders, Knesset legislation (including the Unlawful Combatants Law), emergency regulations, and court decisions, complemented by official statements, OHCHR materials, and NGO documentation. Where available, lawyer interviews and detainee testimonies informed case studies of Gaza residents, children, and activists.

Results: Post-October measures expanded arrest powers, lengthened pre-indictment detention, delayed judicial review, restricted access to counsel, designated new detention facilities (e.g., Sde Teiman), and broadened online "incitement" enforcement. "Iron Swords" orders extended timelines under MO 1651; emergency amendments to the Unlawful Combatants Law enabled prolonged detention without prompt review; and civil criminal laws applied to Gaza detainees increased interrogation periods and bans on meeting counsel. Administrative detention surged-including unprecedented numbers of children-amid limited oversight and secrecy regarding detainee identity, status, and conditions. A dual legal regime persists: Palestinians face military courts under military law, while settlers in the same territory fall under Israeli civil law.

Discussion: The cumulative effect is a hardening carceral architecture inconsistent with fair-trial guarantees and protections in IHL and IHRL and engaging relevant crimes under the Rome Statute. Considering the ICJ's findings and UN practice, the paper calls for ending discriminatory measures, restoring legal safeguards, ensuring transparency, and advancing third-state non-recognition and accountability.

Introduction: In response to the growing pro-Palestine solidarity movement following October 7, Western State authorities have adopted a strategy of political warfare to suppress dissent.

Methods: Utilising a multidisciplinary approach, the paper analyses legal documents, media reports, and firsthand accounts to identify patterns of repression.

Results: State authorities have used smear campaigns, political policing, and lawfare to punish those who express solidarity with Palestinian rights, stifling and chilling the rights to free speech and assembly - a stepping stone toward the erosion of civil liberties and democratic values.

Discussion: Our analysis suggests that using intimidation, administrative harassment, and State coercion to stigmatise, censor, and criminalise dissenters, Western States may have institutionalised punitive torture. The suppression of pro-Palestinian voices in liberal democracies can be hypothesised as a reflection of the colonial hierarchy embedded in the creation and maintenance of the structural oppression against Palestinians across historic Palestine and beyond, merely replicated to suppress solidarity.

During the years that have passed since the adoption of the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment in 2002, a treaty aiming at strengthening and systematising the prevention of torture and ill-treatment through preventive visits, important publications have seen the light of day, providing legal as well as practical frameworks to these endeavours. Central here is the practical guide on the role of national preventive mechanisms (NPMs) (OHCHR, Professional Training Series no 212), Carver and Handley's book (2016) "Does Torture Prevention Work?", and the many statements and reports issued both by the SPT (Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment) and the CPT (European Committee for the Prevention of Torture). With the publication of Malcolm D. Evans' book, "Tackling Torture. Prevention in Practice" in 2023, we have a resource for this particular area of work, which is a must. It is a must whether one is participating in monitoring work - on a national or international level, engages in a legal, health or community context with persons deprived of liberty, as a student or professional, or as one defending human rights in our societies, as activists and civil society organisations, or just plainly interested in the topic.

Introduction: This article examines Israel's surveillance architecture in Gaza as a modality of coercive governance, assessing when and how digitally mediated practices may meet elements of torture under the UN Convention against Torture (UNCAT). The analysis is situated within debates on necropolitics, panopticism, and surveillance.

Materials and methods: We conduct a doctrinal review of UNCAT Article 1, triangulating NGO investigations, legal filings, and investigative journalism with scholarship on surveillance and trauma.

Results: Reported systems-facial-recognition programs, large data-fusion databases, spyware, and persistent aerial surveillance-create conditions of continuous visibility and anticipatory threat. Testimonies and clinical reports describe hypervigilance, sleep disruption, depressive symptoms, and other markers of severe mental suffering, alongside state-actor involvement and asserted purposes (intimidation, coercion, punishment). Corroboration varies by source, but evidence converges on patterned psychological harm linked to surveillance exposure.

Discussion: On the record reviewed, Gaza's surveillance practices plausibly satisfy UNCAT's severity, state-involvement, and purpose elements, with intent inferred from design and deployment patterns; definitive legal determinations rest with competent tribunals.

Recommendations: We recommend independent monitoring with unimpeded access, standardized documentation of surveillance-related mental harm, export-control due diligence for military-AI systems, and safeguards against indiscriminate datafication in conflict zones.

Introduction: This editorial introduces a Special Section on Israel and the Palestinian Occupation, framing the occupation as a coercive environment sustained by state policies and reinforced by broad public endorsement. It contrasts Israeli security narratives with Palestinian realities of siege, displacement, and mass violence. A review of United Nations reports, alongside analyses by Israeli and international NGOs, reveals a broad consensus that current policies amount to unfolding genocidal practices Materials and methods: Evidence is synthesized from survivor testimonies, forensic and clinical reports, legal analyses, NGO and UN documentation, and a review of Israeli public-opinion surveys (2023-2025) addressing support for hard policies.

Results:  There is extensive documentation of the massive harm inflicted on the population of Gaza, with consequences likely to cause permanent damage across generations. Opinion polls reveal striking levels of support among Jewish Israelis for extreme measures: in July 2025, 79% reported being "not troubled" by famine in Gaza; a June 2025 aChord survey found 64% agreed that there are "no innocents" in Gaza; 68% opposed humanitarian aid; and between 60-74% supported the forced exile of all Gazans. Tolerance for torture has also increased. These attitudes, which foster an environment for the escalation of the unfolding genocide, align with at least twenty reinforcing mechanisms analyzed in the editorial-ranging from fear and rage after the October 7 attacks and subsequent Hamas actions, to exclusive victimhood narratives, systematic dehumanization, lawfare strategies, media polarization, and strategic-political incentives that normalize genocidal policies.

Conclusion: The alignment of state policies, public endorsement, and psychosocial mechanisms fosters conditions for genocide. Preventing its continuation requires confronting the social drivers of atrocity-an imperative that falls to international actors, but above all to Israeli institutions and citizens committed to a peace grounded in justice and reparation.