05/06/2026 Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development
Joseph O’Reilly (EPP/CD), General Rapporteur for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on the situation of women and children in the Palestinian territories, made the following statement today:
“I am most alarmed by the ongoing detention and mistreatment of Palestinian children by Israeli authorities. Each year, between 500 and 700 Palestinian children, some as young as twelve, are arrested and processed through the Israeli military court system – the majority on charges such as stone-throwing.
At the end of 2025, 351 Palestinian children were detained in Israeli prisons according to the Israeli Prison Service. Just over half of these are held in administrative detention without charge or trial – the highest number and proportion on record since 2008.
In addition, data on children held in military detention centres has been unavailable since October 2020, and the International Committee of the Red Cross has been barred from access since October 2023. Children here are reportedly exposed to inhumane and degrading conditions, including overcrowding, starvation, physical abuse and complete isolation from family and lawyers.
Legal representation faces increasing hurdles: scheduled visits are cancelled or severely restricted, vital materials are denied, and lawyers are forbidden from conveying simple family messages. These obstacles not only impede basic justice but exacerbate the psychological torment of detained children.
The systematic use of administrative detention, torture and solitary confinement stands in clear violation of Article 37 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child – a treaty ratified by Israel. Recent months have also seen cases of children being subjected to indefinite detention.
I strongly call upon Israel to honour its obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to immediately release detained Palestinian children and to ensure accountability for the violations of their rights to which they have been subjected. Council of Europe member states and the international community must join together in demanding immediate redress for this unacceptable treatment of Palestinian children in Israeli captivity.”