Ngo comments on the Initial Israeli State Report on Implementing the un convention on the Rights of the Child

Acknowledgements

Some DCI-Israel board members (Advocate Eliyahu Abram, Chair, Professor Charles Greenbaum, Deputy Chair, Professor Ruth Butler, Mr. Hillel Bardien, and advocate Helen Motro) together with DCI-Israel advisory board member, Professor Leon Sheleff, formed the “think tank” of the NGO Report. In addition, the input of Professor Leslie Sebba of DCI -Israel’s advisory board, and Rabbi Yehiel Greneman of the organization “Rabbis for Human Rights” and Dr. Hannah Niedorf of the Jerusalem Council for Children and youth are appreciated. Advocate Jamil Dalcwar of Adalah gave very valuable comments.

On March 17, the conclusions on the report were discussed by the DCI –Israel board, and on March 18 the conclusions were further discussed with MK Tamar Gozansky, Dr. Eyal Gross, Shuli Dichter of Sikkuy, and Dr. Na’ama Carmi of ACRI, advocate Stefanie Raker of Israel Women’s Network, Maja Goldman of Kesher, DCI -Israel lawyers Vivy Rechnitz, Gal Torres, and Jonathan Weingarten. DCI-Israel intern from the Rothberg School for Overseas Students of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Ella Rosenberg helped to finish the manuscript. Yael Mendlinger, intern from the Minerva Institute for Human Rights of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem wrote a draft for the introduction chapter. Several years ago Sarah Gundle wrote a first draft. Chapter VIII was rewritten by Dr. Ruth Firer, Director of Peace Education Projects of the Harry S. Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace, of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Board member of DCI- Israel.

Advocate Einat Hurvitz of the Israel Religious Action Center rewrote several sections of the report (Article 7 and Article 14). Nihaya Daoud, MPH, RN, MED of the school of Public Health of Hadassah and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem contributed to the part on health and health services (Article 24). Curt Arnson of Hamoked (the Center for the Defense of the Individual) wrote the sections on children in East Jerusalem. Professor Rachel Zeva and Professor Arza Churchman of the Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning of the Israel Technological Institute (Technion) in Haifa wrote a background paper for us to better understand Article 31 (Play and Leisure) in the Israeli Context.

Attorney at law of DCI-Israel, Vivvi Rechnitz wrote the part on psychiatric hospitalization (Article 40), attorney at law Mahmoud Rabah (lawyer for DCI -Israel in East Jerusalem) contributed to the section on torture, degrading treatment and deprivation of liberty (Article 37) of Palestinian children in East Jerusalem. We are grateful that we could use affidavits obtained by the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI).

Linda Livni edited the first two chapters, and Dan Leon rewrote the executive summary. Shalom Kweller designed the cover of this publication. Photos used for the cover are were taken by photojournalists of “Flash-Ninety” in Jerusalem and show respectively, MK Tamar Gozansky, a child in East Jerusalem, and Deputy Attorney General Judith Karp (also member of the CRC Committee.) The book was printed by InstiPrint. Jean-Luc Range of |DCI-France translated the Executive Summary into French.

Table of Contents

	Executive Summary	3
	Acknowledgements	5
	Index of Terms Used	10
I	Introduction	12
A.	The Initial State Report	12
B.	Formulation of the NGO assessment	17
C.	Positive Measures already adopted	19
D.	The context in which children’s rights must be implemented	20
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	25
II.	General Measures of Implementation	26
A.	Article 4 – Implementation obligations of the State	26
B.	Article 42 – The duty to publicize the provisions of the Convention	35
C.	Article 44 – Reporting obligations of the State and its duty to make the report widely available	36
D.	The need for a Knesset-appointed ombudsman for children	37
E.	Commissioner for Future Generations	37
F.	The Knesset Committee for the advancement of the Status of Children	38
G.	Local status of Children Committees	38
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	40
III.	Definition of the Child	41
	Article 1 – A child is every human being below the age of 18, unless under law, majority is attained earlier	41
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	50
IV.	General Principles	51
A.	Article 2 – Non-discrimination and equal opportunity	51
	Discrimination on a National Basis	53
	Discrimination against children of foreign workers	57
	Ethnic discrimination within the Jewish sector	59
	Discrimination according to geographic distribution	60
	Discrimination in East Jerusalem Discrimination by gender and sexual orientation Discrimination against children with disabilities	61 62 64
B.	Article 3 – The best interests of the child	64
C.	Article 6 – The right to life, survival and development	67
D.	Article 12 – The right to respect for views of the child	77
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	82
V.	Civil Liberties and Freedoms	83
A.	Article 7 – The rights to a name and nationality	84
B.	Article 8 – The right to preservation of identity	89
C.	Article 13 – The right to freedom of expression	94
D.	Article 14 – The right to freedom of conscience, thought and religion	96
E.	Article 15 – The right to freedom of association and peaceful assembly	99
F.	Article 16 – The right to preservation of privacy	99
G.	Article 17 – The right to access to appropriate information	101
H.	Article 37(a) – The right not to be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment	109
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	114
VI.	Family Environment and Alternative Care	115
A.	Article 5 –Parental guidance and Evolving Capacities of the Child	118
B.	Article 18 – Parental responsibilities	121
C.	Article 9 – The right not to be unjustly separated from the parents	123
D.	Article 10 – The right to family reunification	124
E.	Article 11 – Protection from illicit transfer and non-return	130
F.	Article 27 – The right to recovery of maintenance for the child	132
G.	Article 20 – Children deprived of their family environment	132
H.	Article 21 –Adoption	136
I.	Article 25 – The right to periodic review of placement	139
J.	Article 19 – The right to protection from abuse and neglect	140
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	147
VII.	Basic Health and Welfare	149
A.	Article 23 – Children with disabilities	150
B.	Article 24 – The right to health and health services	155
C.	Articles 26 and 18 – Social Security, and child care services and facilities	168
D.	Article 27 – The right to an adequate standard of living	171
	Suggested Questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	181
VIII.	Education, Play, Leisure, and Cultural Activities	182
A.	Article 28 – The right to accessible, respectful education	183
	Regular Educational Facilities	187
	Education for Palestinian Children in East Jerusalem	192
	Education for Palestinian Children in the Occupied Territories	193
	Internal Cooperation	198
	Special Education	194
B.	Article 29 – The aims of education	199
C.	Article 31 – The right to play, leisure, recreation and cultural activities	207
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	211
IX.	Special Protection Measures	213
A.	Children in emergency situations
	Article 22 – The right of refugee children to protection and humanitarian assistance	214
	Article 38 – The duty to ensure respect for the rules of international humanitarian law pertaining to children in armed conflict	216
	Article 39 – The duty to provide appropriate measures to rehabilitate child victims	220
B.	Children involved with the system of administrative and juvenile justice
	Article 40 – The right of children in conflict with the law to be treated with dignity and respect	220
C.	Children in situations of exploitation including physical and psychological recovery and social reintegration
	Article 32 – The right to protection from economic exploitation	229
	Article 34 – The Right to protection from sexual exploitation	231
	Article 35­­­­­­­­­­ – Prevention of abduction, sale and trafficking	236
	Article 33- The Right to protection from narcotic and psychotropic drugs	237
D.	Article 30 – Children of linguistic minorities or indigenous peoples	239
	Suggested questions to the Government by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child	246
X.	Concluding Comments	248
A.	Introduction	248
B.	Positive aspects	248
C.	Factors and difficulties impeding the implementation of the CRC	251
XI.	Appendices	257
1.	List of Israel Children’s Rights Coalition member organizations contributing to this report	257
2.	Selected web sites	268
3.	Addendum to the proposal by the Military Judge Advocate General for a Military Service Law (amendment no, 13) (minimum recruitment age) 2002.	269
4.	Statistics on Israeli and Palestinian minors killed since the beginning of the intifada, Minors killed since 1991	270
5.	Adalah Document on Discrimination	271
6.	Executive Summary in Hebrew, Arabic and French	282

List of Tables

Table 1	Israeli Laws Pertaining to Children and Adolescents (arranged by categories of age).	47
Table 2	Suicide Rates between the ages 10-17	160
Table 3	Poverty Line in Israel by Family Size	169
Table 4	Poverty Rates in Israel: Child-Population 1992-2000 (percentages)	172
Table 5	Poor Children in Israel after Taxation and Welfare Redistribution 1992-1995 (absolute numbers)	172
Table 6	Comparison of Poverty Rates among the Child Populations in Various Countries (percentages)	172
Table 7	East Jerusalem House Demolitions	178
Table 8	House Demolitions in the West Bank	179
Table 9	Participation of the Ministry of Education in Budgets of Cultural Institutions	207

Index of Terms Used

Aliya – The immigration of Jews to Israel.

Arab-Bedouins – Originally nomadic indigenous Arab people of the region.

Arab-Druze – A religious minority within Israel that is part of the Arab minority.

Area A – Those areas of the occupied territories where the Palestinian Authority is responsible for civil and security matters.

Area B – Those areas of the occupied territories where Israel controls security arrangement and the Palestinian Authority handles civil issues.

Area C – Those areas of the occupied territories solely under Israel’s control.

Note: Under the Oslo Agreements the occupied territories were divided into three areas with various autonomous arrangements as described above.

Ashkenazim – Jews whose culture originated and developed in Europe.

CRC – UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

.

Green Line – The borders of Israel prior to June 1967.

GSS – General Security Service of Israel (Shabak).

Halacha – Jewish religious law.

IDF – The Israeli Defense Forces, the Israeli Army.

Intifada – Violent Palestinian uprising initiated by Palestinian leaders against prolonged Israeli occupation.

Israel Proper – The State of Israel within the "green line" borders recognized by the United Nations (i.e. excluding territories acquired in the 1967 war.)

Kibbutz – An Israeli commune in which responsibilities for labor, welfare, and child-rearing are performed collectively, originally based on agriculture but now also engaging in industry.

Knesset – The Israeli Parliament.

MK – Member of Knesset.

PA – Palestinian National Authority.

Palestinian Citizens – An Arab¹ who is a citizen of Israel (residing within Israel proper). While recognizing that members of this group refer to themselves by various names including Arab, Palestinian-Israeli, Palestinian, and Israeli- Arab, this report uses the term “Arab- Israeli” to make it easier for the reader to distinguish between Arabs living inside Israel proper, and Palestinians of the Palestinian Authority territories in West Bank and Gaza Strip. In this report we use the terms Arab-Israeli and Palestinian Citizen interchangeably

Sephardim – Jews whose culture originated and developed in Spain, Portugal, North Africa as well as Arab countries in the Middle East.

Settlements – Jewish Colonies in the West Bank and Gaza. According to the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics’ data² in December 2001, 204,900 Jews lived in settlements in 2001.

Sha’ria – Muslim law

Ultra-orthodox – Jews following the strictest versions of Judaism

Yeshiva – Ultra-orthodox educational institution for the study of Torah.

I. Introduction