Torture and Ill-Treatment: Israel's Interrogation of Palestinians from the Occupied Territories

Abstract

Human Rights Watch/Middle East, Human Rights Watch, $20, pp 316, ISBN 1 56432 136 3 To a human rights organisation whether a country is a liberal democracy or a dictatorship does not make much difference in assessing its human rights record. Even liberal states look to their security first. Human rights organisations look to internationally sanctioned moral principles. The two rarely meet. In Torture and Ill-Treatment there is little discussion of Israel's political problem, which continues to develop new forms, only Israel's reaction to acts of violence against it. Yet the real issue is whether it uses disproportionate violence to stop violent attacks against its citizens. The book is worth reading for the accounts it gives of torture, which should always be exposed; but it would be better if it could …