THE Right to Education Campaign (REC) today condemned the Israeli military raid that resulted in the detention of 10 students of Birzeit University as ‘outrageous’.
REC said in a press statement that the Israeli Occupying Forces continue to target Birzeit University students as over 20 students were arrested in a predawn raid as they were on a group trip at Al-Zarqa spring, close to Aboud village, northwest of Ramallah.
The soldiers eventually arrested 10 of the students and released the others.
‘REC rejects this outrageous attack, which constitutes a direct violation of their basic human rights, including their right to education,’ the statement read.
REC added that it was following up on the detained students’ cases, and called on all legal and relevant human rights organisations to stand by their role in protecting the rights of Palestinian students.
Founded in 1988, REC introduced itself as the product of a long history of activism at Birzeit University in response to the ongoing violations of academic freedoms and the right to education at Palestinian educational institutions by the Israeli Occupation forces.
Meanwhile, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) recently announced that, according to its calculations, the number of children denied treatment outside Gaza had nearly doubled. This number includes children younger than one.
According to the organisation, in 2020, 17 per cent of children’s requests to leave the Gaza Strip for the purpose of receiving medical care not available in the Gaza Strip, were delayed or refused.
In the first six months of 2021, this rate had nearly doubled to 32 per cent, according to calculations of the PHRI.
The World Health Organisation, estimates that 155 out of a total 481 Palestinians under the age of 18 seeking to cross the Erez checkpoint for treatment in July this year, were either refused or delayed.
Among 0-3 year olds, 30 children out of 136, were rejected or delayed in seeking treatment.
Such obstructions can prove fatal.
