Israel Defends Its Questioning Methods Before U.N. Panel

Israel vigorously defended its interrogation practices before a U.N. human rights committee Wednesday, arguing that the country’s questioning methods had helped prevent about 90 terrorist attacks in the past two years.

Nili Arad, director general of Israel’s Ministry of Justice, justified what he called Israel’s “exceptional interrogation methods” before independent experts of the U.N. Committee Against Torture, who questioned whether such practices amounted to torture.

Israel is one of the countries under periodic review before the panel, which meets twice a year in Geneva to discuss adherence by nations that have signed the Convention Against Torture.

Members brushed aside results of an Israeli investigation that acquitted of criminal wrongdoing those who questioned 29-year-old Palestinian prisoner Abdel Samad Harizat in 1995. Harizat died in custody.

Bent Sorensen, a Danish member of the committee, said that autopsy evidence supported the conclusion that Harizat died of injuries from being violently shaken during questioning by Israeli security officials.

More than 20 Palestinians, most recently Harizat, have died in Israeli prisons since 1987.

In November, Israel’s Supreme Court lifted an injunction against the use of force in the interrogation of Palestinian detainees in certain cases. Since then, critics have accused the Jewish state of approving torture during investigations.