Palestinian Authority Libel: Prisoners are used for Nazi-like medical experiments

By Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook

Introduction:

The Palestinian Authority is intensifying its longstanding blood libel campaign against Israel, falsely accusing Israel of conducting horrific Nazi-like medical experiments on Palestinian prisoners. These fabrications have been featured repeatedly in the Palestinian Authority's official newspaper, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, which is under the direct authority of Mahmoud Abbas.

In the past week alone there were three new examples of this libel:

"The method employed by the Israeli Occupation in which they [are] instigating slow death ... doctors in Israeli prison clinics use the prisoners as guinea pigs for clinical drug testing under the pretense of 'treatment.'" [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 6, 2008]

"Many of the male and female inmates received injections from needles they had not seen before, and which caused their hair and facial hair to fall out permanently ... others lost their sanity, or their mental condition is constantly deteriorating... and some are suffering from infertility." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 4, 2008]

"The doctors in these prison clinics are using the prisoners as guinea pigs for clinical testing of drugs and treatment-methods." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 3, 2008]

Giving voice to blood libels and slandering Israel are essential tools used by the Palestinian Authority to demonize Israel and to inflame hatred against Israel, especially on the highly sensitive subject of Palestinian prisoners. It is therefore not surprising that the Palestinian public places the release of Palestinian terrorists from Israeli prisons as a national cause, and justifies all means -- including the abduction of Israeli soldiers - to free the prisoners from their supposed mistreatment.

Al-Hayat Al-Jadida has attested that reports about such "experiments" performed on Palestinian prisoners serve to "mobilize each and every human-being as such... to actively participate in activities aimed at their release and their return to freedom, properly meant as a return to life... all of us! all of us! all of us! - to confront the enemy in the war it wages." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 3, 2007]

These new accusations build on earlier libels that Israel conducts the same kind of experiments on Palestinian prisoners as the Nazis did in the concentration camps:

"We have many examples of experiments conducted by the Nazis, but we shall bring one example that exhibits a great similarity [to the Israeli experiments]: They would insert poisons into the prisoners' food in order to study the effect of the poisons on people, with the purpose of performing autopsies on the bodies of those who died from the poison. He mentioned multiple cases of the mass poisoning of Palestinian and Arab prisoners in several Israeli prisons and detention centers. He did not rule out the possibility that the mass poisonings were done deliberately." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 1, 2007].

Furthermore, the libel adds that Israel is deliberately laboring "to increase the suffering of the prisoners and to murder them slowly, or to render them hollow, fragile and sickly bodies that will be a burden to their families and their nation after their release..." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept.1, 2007].

According to the libel, because Israel views the prisoners as guinea pigs, "the terrible crime, unimaginably horrific, that was committed by the executioner jailers of the occupation forces... demonstrated that the prisoner is treated like a lab -mouse." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 3, 2007].

In an attempt to increase the credibility of the libel about the treatment of prisoners, the Palestinian Authority daily last week repeated a media invention from a previous article. It said that Dalia Itzik, Speaker of the Knesset, said in 1997 that Israel conducts "thousands of medical clinical trials," and that "experiments with dangerous drugs are performed each year on Palestinian prisoners." The story also rehashed the fabrication that an Israeli named Amy Laftat, who was presented as Head of the Pharmaceutical Division in the Ministry of Health, reported that "there is a 15% annual increase in the number of permits granted by her office for conducting research on dangerous medications on Palestinians" [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 4, 2008]. Palestinian Media Watch checked with Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik and the Ministry of Health, and confirmed that these statements were never made, and in fact that there is no one named Amy Laftat working for the Pharmaceutical Division. (The Israeli responses are below).

Following are more complete texts of the Prisoners Libel, as promoted by the Palestinian Authority's official Daily, al-Hayat al-Jadida:

1: "Prisoners lost their eyesight and the functionality of their nervous system"

"The Occupation forces continue to conduct medical experiments on Palestinian and Arab prisoners in their prisons, in defiance of every international treaty and code of ethics. This is not limited to their policy of medical neglect, but rather the violations even extend to exploitive use of the prisoners as testing subjects for pharmaceutical drugs. Dalia Itzik, then a member of the Israeli Knesset and head of the Science Committee in the Israeli parliament, revealed in July 1997 that thousands of medical clinical trials, experiments with dangerous drugs are performed each year on Palestinian prisoners. At that time, she added that her office held thousands of permits issued by the Israeli Health Ministry for large Israeli pharmaceutical companies permitting the performance of thousands of clinical trials on Palestinian and Arab prisoners in Israeli prisons.

Additionally, 'Amy Laftat,' Head of the Pharmaceutical Division in the Israeli Health Ministry, revealed before the Knesset in that same meeting that there is a 15% annual increase in the number of permits granted by her office for conducting research with dangerous drugs on Palestinians and Arabs in the Israeli prisons.

It should be mentioned that many of the male and female prisoners were given shots from needles they had not seen beforehand, and which caused their hair and facial hair to fall out permanently, and there were other prisoners who lost their eyesight and the functionality of their nervous system, and others who lost their sanity, or whose mental condition is constantly deteriorating, and still others who suffer from infertility and are unable to bear children, etc. [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 4, 2008]

2. "Doctors in Israel use the prisoners as guinea pigs under the pretense of "treatment"

"Abu Al-Hajj [Director of the Abu-Jihad Center for Prisoner Affairs in Al-Quds University] referred back to the period of the British Mandate and its usual method of execution - using the hanging noose that is on display in the museum ... Fahd Abu Al-Hajj went on to mention the subsequent method employed by the Israeli Occupation, in which they finish off by instigating slow death, which the prisoners suffer at the hands of the prison authorities. He added that as a result of this method, 226 prisoners have died as shahids (martyrs) in the prisons... Abu Al-Hajj pointed to the fact that... clinic doctors in Israeli prisons are using the prisoners as guinea pigs under the pretense of "treatment."
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 6, 2008]

3. "The prisoner is treated like a lab mouse."

Heading: "Drugs and Lab-Mice"

..."The reports came gushing in... of the terrible crime, unimaginably horrific, that was committed by the executioner jailers of the occupation forces; the occupation forces used several of the freedom prisoners as lab accessories for conducting medical trials. This crime committed by the occupiers demonstrates... that the prisoner is treated like a lab mouse - who will either be killed by an inappropriate drug, or will be hurt by an electrical shock. Otherwise the experiment should inflict a permanent disability or deformity upon him... this is something that mobilizes each and every human-being as such... to actively participate in activities aimed at their release and their return to freedom, properly meant as a return to life... all of us! all of us! all of us! - to confront the enemy in the war it wages against those of us who are alive and those who are dead"...
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 3, 2007]

4. "Prisoners as guinea pigs for drug and treatment clinical testing."

Headline: "Reports given by two lawyers after visiting [prisons] indicate an increase in the policy of provoking the prisoners".

The director of the Center for the Defense of Freedoms and Civil Rights, "Hurriyat", Hilmi Al-Araj said that the reports given by the two lawyers from the center, Ibtisam Al-Anati and Raed Al-Zabi, clearly point to a documented increase in the Israeli Prison Authority's policy of provoking the male and female prisoners and of treating them inhumanely; this includes, most notably, a policy requiring the prisoners [to wear] an orange garment, and the use doctors in these prison clinics make of the prisoners as guinea pigs for drug and treatment clinical testing." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 3, 2008]

5. "Most suffer infertility problems, others have lost their eyesight."

Headline: "Most suffer infertility problems, others have lost their eyesight and their sanity after the occupation has injected them with unidentified substances and drugs - Israel continues to use prisoners as guinea pigs for pharmaceutical drug-testing."
"Abd Al-Nasser Piroanah, researcher and head of the Statistical Department in the [Palestinian] Ministry of Prisoner and Released Prisoner Affairs, said in his report that the Occupation Authorities conduct clinical testing on Palestinian and Arab prisoners in prisons, in defiance of every international treaty and code of ethics.

The general tragic state of the prisons escapes no one, and the medical situation all the more so... In order to increase the suffering of the prisoners and to murder them slowly, or to render them hollow, fragile and sickly bodies that will be a burden to their families and their nation after their release...

Further, he stated: This is not limited to their policy of medical neglect, but rather the violations even extend to exploitive use of the prisoners as testing subjects for pharmaceutical drugs.

Knesset Member Dalia Itzik and former Head of the Science Committee revealed in July 1997 that thousands of medical clinical trials, experiments with dangerous drugs are performed each year on Palestinian prisoners. At that time, she added that her office held thousands of permits issued by the Israeli Health Ministry for large Israeli pharmaceutical companies permitting the performance of thousands of clinical trials on Palestinian and Arab prisoners in Israeli prisons. Additionally, 'Amy Laftat,' Head of the Pharmaceutical Division in the Israeli Health Ministry, revealed ... that there is a 15% annual increase in the number of permits granted by her office for conducting research with dangerous drugs on Palestinians and Arabs in the Israeli prisons.

The researcher concluded that this crime is only becoming more widespread... under the auspices of the Israeli Health Ministry ... These crimes reflect clearly on the degree of racism which abounds in the Israeli system as a whole... He brought many examples of male and female prisoners who were given injections from needles they had not seen before, and which caused their hair and facial hair to fall out permanently, and there were other prisoners who lost their eyesight and the functionality of their nerve system, and others who lost their sanity, or whose mental condition is constantly deteriorating, and still others who suffer from infertility and so forth...

Piroanah mentioned that the first to use prisoners for medical experiments were the Nazis, who did it in the detention centers of the German army during WWII...

He added: We have many examples of experiments conducted by the Nazis, but we shall bring one example that exhibits a great similarity [to the Israeli experiments]: They would insert poisons into the prisoners' food in order to study the effect of the poisons on people and with the purpose of performing autopsies on the bodies of those who died from the poison. He mentioned multiple cases of the mass poisoning of Palestinian and Arab prisoners in several Israeli prisons and detention centers. He did not rule out the possibility that the mass poisonings were done deliberately.

He said the Ministry of Prisoner Affairs has been conducting activities in the past months... aimed at pressuring international opinion to act urgently and to adhere to its moral and human responsibility to save the prisoners... and to investigate the serious medical circumstances found in Israeli prisons, and to bring the war criminals to international courts." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Sept. 1, 2007]

6. "Clinics are nothing but open grounds for experimenting with dangerous drugs."

"Dr Awda emphasized that health conditions in Israeli prisons are bad and dangerous... She emphasized that the clinics are nothing but open grounds for experimenting with dangerous drugs on the sick prisoners. She proved this with a statement given by the Head of the Knesset Science Committee Dalia Itzik on July 10, 1997, in which she claimed that every year 1000 clinical trials of dangerous pharmaceutical drugs are conducted using Palestinian prisoners as subjects." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, April 17, 2008]

Israeli Officials Respond

Office of Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik: "Knesset Speaker Itzik never made the statements attributed to her. Knesset Speaker Itzik is certain that incidents of this kind do not occur in Israel; this is not how Israel conducts itself."

Ministry of Health's Response: "Clinical testing on prisoners in prison was never approved, never performed, and is most certainly not taking place at present. Furthermore, there is no person named Amy Laftat working for the Pharmaceutical Division.