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IMA Denies Involvement of Israeli Doctors in Torture
Health and Human Rights
Israel Medical Association: response to Derek Summerfield
Yoram Blachar President, Israel Medical Association, RamatGan, Israel 30 January 2003
Article Outline
Derek Summerfield once again has succeeded in imposing his simplistic view of good versus evil on your readership.1 I am genuinely pleased that Summerfield does not live in a country under the constant siege of terror, and thus does not need to grapple with complex ethical issues, but can merely dictate to others his standard of exemplary behaviour.
Torture is abhorrent and the IMA in no way endorses it. The IMA was, and remains, a signatory to the Declaration of Tokyo. Similarly, the Israeli Supreme Court banned the use of physical pressure during interrogations in 1999, and the IMA stands firmly behind the law. Even before this decision, the IMA always unequivocally stated that no doctors should be involved in torture. This last fact leads us to conclude that Summerfield is deliberately blurring the lines between Israeli government policy and the IMA's role in monitoring the conduct of its members.
Read more: IMA Denies Involvement of Israeli Doctors in Torture
'A Couple Of Broken Fingers'
Health and Human Rights
Volume 361, Issue 9355, 1 February 2003, Page 424
What is the WMA for? The case of the Israeli Medical Association
Derek Summerfield Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AB, UK
The then Head of Ethics of the Israeli Medical Association (IMA), Eran Dolev, gave an interview on Nov 25, 1999, to a four-member delegation from the Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture, London, UK, headed by the director, Helen Bamber. During the interview, Dolev stated that “a couple of broken fingers” during the interrogation of Palestinian men was a price worth paying for information. Imagine if the Head of Ethics of the British Medical Association (BMA) had said this in relation to police or army interrogations in Northern Ireland.
Dolev's admission crystallised a position that campaigners had inferred from the IMA's silence over many years on the use of torture in Israel.1 In 1996, Amnesty International concluded that Israeli doctors working with the security services “form part of a system in which detainees are tortured, ill-treated and humiliated in ways that place prison medical practice in conflict with medical ethics”.2 Amnesty also pointed to Israeli government statements that detainees were “under constant medical supervision”.2 The IMA took no action, though they have elsewhere stated that they would investigate if irregular behaviour by an individual doctor was reported to them. This stance is disingenuous: the problem is not isolated malpractice (and who would report this anyway, since the word of Palestinian detainees is discounted by the IMA who have never responded to local testimonies), but institutionalised practice—as Amnesty has made clear. The IMA have long been impervious to discreet appeals made to them from organisations such as Physicians for Human Rights (USA) and Amnesty.
Blachar Now Heads Global Ethics
5 November 2008 Derek Summerfield writes to say the long standing President of the IMA, Yoram Blachar, becomes President of the World Med Assoc. It had escaped The Medical Committee for Boycott of the Israeli Medical Association (IMA) that he had been President-elect of the WMA.
For those familiar with the role Blachar has played over many years, for him to become President of the official international watchdog on medical ethics is an event beyond satire, as when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace. Next thing Donald Rumsfeld is going to pop up as the head of Amnesty International...
Just for openers, the1975 Declaration of Tokyo, which forbids doctors to participate or collude with torture, is a WMA document. Yet Blachar is on record in no less than the Lancet as supporting the use of “moderate physical pressure” (the Israeli euphemism for torture, and condemned as torture by the UN Committee on Torture). This is not something you see everyday in an international medical journal from the head of a national medical association (Blachar Y. The truth about Israeli medical ethics. Lancet 1997;350:1247) . He has played a consistent and trusty role over many years in batting away approaches from both Israeli organisations (PHR-I, Public Committee Against Torture) and international ones (Amnesty, Human Rights Watch, various UN agencies, aid agencies like Medecins Sans Frontieres etc) regarding the extent of documentation in the public realm about the everyday collusion by Israeli doctors with torture as state policy.
He has refused to condemn the systematic violations of the Fourth Geneva Convention being applied in the siege of Gaza- those sections that guarantee a civilian population unimpeded access to materials and services vital to life, including health services, and which guarantee immunity to health professionals as they work. A morally abhorrent track record of quite unusual clarity.
The WMA is there to address the violations of medical ethics to which I and others have been pointing for years, but it has of course long since been sewn up. That was what Blachar was there for, I am afraid. As I have written before, when the official and ‘normal’ channels do not function or will not function, we can either give up or move on to other approaches. This is where our calls for a boycott of the IMA, and indeed the whole academic boycott campaign, come in.
On the other hand he and the IMA arguably now present a bigger target.
David Halpin suggests this article is read for a picture of the torment of a whole population.
Holding Health to Ransom
4 Aug 2008
PHR-Israel published a new report on August 4, 2008 entitled: "Holding Health to Ransom: GSS Interrogation and Extortion of Palestinian Patients at Erez Crossing". Testimonies in the report reveal: GSS (Shabac) demands cooperation as a precondition for exiting Gaza for medical care In defiance of the UN Convention Against Torture, the GSS is attempting to systematically use sick patients as informers.
Since July 2007, PHR has received 32 testimonies from Gazan patients, whose exit from Gaza was prevented after refusing to cooperate with GSS interrogators at the Erez Crossing. Since October 2007, some of the Palestinian patients with referrals for medical treatment outside of Gaza are required to undergo a GSS interrogation as an integral part of the decision-making process regarding their request for an exit permit.
In a new report released on August 4th, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-Israel) has exposed that the General Security Service (GSS- Shabac), who make the final decisions regarding exit permits, are targeting sick patients as potential collaborators, making informing and cooperation with the GSS a pre-condition for exiting Gaza. This practice constitutes a violation of The Fourth Geneva Convention and the UN Convention Against Torture, as well as criminal law.
For the first time in the report Holding Health to Ransom, Palestinian patients testify as to the process they undergo when attempting to exit Gaza for medical treatment. Eleven detailed first-person testimonies of patients who were subjected to interrogation and pressure are included in the report.
Human crisis in Israeli occupied territories
BMJ 2006;332:1276 (27 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7552.1276-b
Letter Humanitarian crisis in Israeli occupied territories
EDITOR ”Why has there been so little international outcry about the humanitarian crisis in the Israeli occupied territories reported in the BMJ and by the Physicians for Human Rights Israel?''1 2 It is stunning how documentation from international and regional human rights organisations, all pointing the same way (Amnesty International alone has issued 301 reports since September 2003), is ignored or dismissed as evidence of anti-Israel bias or of anti-Semitism. It is hard not to conclude that behind this selective blindness is a view of the captive Palestinian population as not in the same moral universe.
We should note with shame that the International Committee of the BMA, who are members of the World Medical Association (WMA, the international watchdog on medical ethics), has not raised in that forum the grotesque events unfolding in the occupied territories, still less challenged the persistent silence of fellow members, the Israeli Medical Association. The WMA is in violation of its own mandate. For the BMA International Committee, as members of the WMA, to ignore such massive and sustained violations of the Geneva convention, which guarantees a population's right to health care, and not to challenge the silence of the relevant national medical association, is to demonstrate straightforward collusion. If this is not a form of medical malpractice then I have lost my bearings: it should be a matter for the General Medical Council. I call on BMA members to speak out where it matters, including at the annual representatives meeting next month. I would be happy to hear from members who feel this cannot go on.
British doctors call for boycott of IMA
BMJ 2007;334:871 (28 April), doi:10.1136/bmj.39196.455613.DB
Group of British doctors call for a boycott of the Israel Medical Association Owen Dyer London
A group of British doctors has called for a boycott of the Israeli Medical Association (IMA) and its expulsion from the World Medical Association (WMA) in a letter published in the Guardian newspaper. The petition, signed by 130 doctors, argues that by refusing to criticise Israeli policies in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel, the IMA is failing to uphold international medical ethical standards.
The Israel Defense Forces "have systematically flouted the fourth Geneva convention guaranteeing a civilian population unfettered access to medical services and immunity for medical staff," the letter says, citing reports of soldiers attacking ambulances; patients and essential drugs obstructed at checkpoints, and bombing of the public health infrastructure.
Academic boycotts: RSM under attack by pro-Israel doctors
BMJ 2007;335:842 (27 October), doi:10.1136/bmj.39374.493218.BE
Letters
Academic boycotts: Royal Society of Medicine under attack by pro-Israel doctors
The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.
In relation to the debate about academic boycott and freedom,1 2 it seems relevant to record another way in which the refusal to address the voluminous and independent evidence of medical ethical violations in Israel is being maintained.
The Royal Society of Medicine (RSM) has lately been under attack. Months ago, I was invited to speak at an RSM conference on religion, spirituality and mental health, to contribute to a session on the role of health professionals in conflict situations. As a reflection of my research interests and publications on medical ethics since 1992, my main case study was on Israel and Palestine. Once the conference was publicised, the RSM became subject to pressure from pro-Israel doctors to remove me from the conference programme. They went so far as to threaten a challenge to the RSM constitution as a charity if a "political" (and biased) person were permitted to speak.
After . . . [Full text of this article]
Derek A Summerfield, honorary senior lecturer, Institute of Psychiatry, London
Maudsley Hospital, London SE5 8BB
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Meetings in Israel should be boycotted
BMJ 1996;312:57 (6 January) Letter
International congresses held in Israel should be boycotted
Consultant physician Frenchay Hospital, Bristol BS16 1LR
Chris Burns-Cox
1.Summerfield D. Raising the dead: war, reparation, and the politics of memory. BMJ 1995;311:495-7. (19 August.) [Abstract/Free Full Text]
ConnotRelated Article
Raising the dead: war, reparation, and the politics of memory
Derek Summerfield BMJ 1995 311: 495-497. [Extract] [Full Text]
Humanitarian crisis in Israeli occupied territories: letter
BMJ 2006;332:1276 (27 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7552.1276-b
Humanitarian crisis in Israeli occupied territories
We should note with shame that the International Committee of the BMA, who are members of the World Medical Association (WMA, the international watchdog on medical ethics), has not raised in that forum the grotesque events unfolding in the occupied territories, still less challenged the persistent silence of fellow members, the Israeli Medical Association. The WMA is in violation of its own mandate. For the BMA International Committee, as members of the WMA, to ignore such massive and sustained violations of the Geneva convention, which guarantees a population's right to health care, and not to challenge the silence of the relevant national medical association, is to demonstrate straightforward collusion. If this is not a form of medical malpractice then I have lost my bearings: it should be a matter for the General Medical Council. I call on BMA members to speak out where it matters, including at the annual representatives meeting next month. I would be happy to hear from members who feel this cannot go on.
Derek A Summerfield, honorary senior lecturer
Institute of Psychiatry, Maudsley Hospital, London SE5 8AP
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Competing interests: None declared.
References
1.McGreal C. Aid withdrawal is bringing health service in Gaza to brink of collapse. BMJ 2006;332: 1171. (20 May.)[Free Full Text]
2.Report: Collapse of the Palestinian health system. www.phr.org.il/phr/article.asp?articleid=338&catid=55&pcat=-1&lang=ENG (accessed 20 May 2006).
3.Amnesty International. www.amnesty.org.uk/
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Aid withdrawal is bringing health service in Gaza to brink of collapse
Chris McGreal BMJ 2006 332: 1171. [Extract] [Full Text] [PDF]
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Read all Rapid Responses
The Collapse of Palestinian Health Care
Michael H Mitchell bmj.com, 1 Jun 2006 [Full text]
The BMA responds
Vivienne Nathanson bmj.com, 30 May 2006 [Full text]
Humanitarian crisis in Israeli occupied territories
Sylvia M Watkins bmj.com, 31 May 2006 [Full text]
Humanitarian crisis in Israeli occupied territories
Dr Brian Robinson bmj.com, 1 Jun 2006 [Full text]
Re: Humanitarian crisis in Israeli occupied territories
Dr Brian Robinson bmj.com, 2 Jun 2006 [Full text]
Re: The Collapse of Palestinian Health Care
Abdullah Yonis bmj.com, 4 Jun 2006 [Full text]
Making BMA effective for Palestinian's health problems
Christopher J Burns-Cox bmj.com, 3 Jun 2006 [Full text]
The Collapse of Palestinian Healthcare System in The Israeli Occupied Territories: A Medieval Siege of 1.4 million souls in Gaza
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IDF; Shoot to Kill - letter Derek A Summerfield
BMJ 2005;331:699 (24 September), doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7518.699
Letter
Israeli army's shoot to kill policy; Israeli soldiers confirm the policy documented in journal
EDITOR My personal view last October on the Israeli army operations in the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel, attracted support as well as vilification on bmj.com.1
I noted that two thirds of all Palestinian child fatalities had been caused by small arms fire (from relatively close range), in fully half of the cases to the head or upper torso—the sniper's wound. My statement that "clearly, soldiers are routinely authorised to shoot to kill children in situations of minimal or no threat" has now been confirmed in emphatic fashion—the authority being Israeli soldiers who have committed these acts themselves.2-4 They refer to one of the cases I described.
Several dozen former soldiers calling themselves "Breaking the Silence" are exposing the cynicism of the Israeli defence forces' mantra that everything possible is done to minimise the risk to Palestinian civilians. These soldiers testify that they were ordered in briefings to shoot to kill unarmed civilians, including children, even when there was no threat and in periods of calm. They were ordered to "fire at anything that moved" and were told "every person you see on the street, `kill him.' And we would just do it."4 The attitude was "so kids got killed. For a soldier it means nothing."4
The desire to avenge Israeli casualties and inflict collective punishment was an important factor. In Gaza in May 2004, "the commanders said kill as many people as possible,"4 and there were standing orders to shoot anyone on a roof or balcony, whoever they were. One former soldier said this was why the Moghayyer children (aged 16 and 13), collecting washing and feeding pigeons on the roof of their home, were shot. Israel's defence forces claimed that they had been blown up by a roadside bomb, until journalists were shown the bodies in the morgue, each with a single bullet wound to the head. I mentioned this case in my BMJ article.
Can those who saw my paper as antisemitic lies face "Breaking the Silence"? Will the Jewish organisations that made hostile statements about the BMJ, amid calls for the acting editor to be censured or removed, apologise? And who will challenge the Israeli Medical Association for its silence at the ongoing violations of the Geneva Convention I documented?5 w1
Derek A Summerfield, honorary senior lecturer
Institute of Psychiatry, Maudsley Hospital, London SE5 8AP
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Competing interests: None declared.
Reference w1 is on bmj.com
References
1.Summerfield D. Palestine: the assault on health and other war crimes BMJ 2004;329: 924.[Free Full Text]
2.Amnesty International. Israel/occupied territories: killing of children must be investigated. http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGMDE150552004?open (accessed 16 Sep 2005).
3.Urquhart C. Israeli troops say they were given shoot-to-kill order. Guardian 2005 Sep 6:1 www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1563476,00.html (accessed 15 Sep 2005).
4.Urquhart C. Israeli soldiers tell of discriminate killings by army and a culture of impunity. Guardian 2005 Sep 6:13. www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1563255,00.html (accessed 15 Sep 2005).
5.Barghouti M, ed. Health and segregation. The impact of the Israeli separation wall on access to health services. Ramallah: Health, Development, Information, and Policy Institute, 2004.
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