ACRI’s Education Department recently completed the pilot stage of a groundbreaking project to acquaint the staff of security prisons, in which Palestinian security prisoners and detainees are held, with human rights values in the context of their work. ACRI believes that prison officials play a key role in ensuring that the rights of prisoners and detainees in their custody are respected and upheld. As Former Supreme Court President Aharon Barak said, “A society’s level of democracy can be measured by its treatment of prisoners.”
At the request of the Israeli Prisons Commissioner, ACRI launched the security prisons program in 2008 to address the specific human rights concerns prison wardens and staff encounter in their trying jobs, and to explore the multiple tensions associated with the incarceration of Palestinian security prisoners and detainees. In 16-hour workshops spread out over four sessions, participants discuss various issues relating to human rights in the context of their jobs. Workshops provide participants with an introduction to human rights theory and explore the dilemmas inherent in balancing the rights of prisoners and detainees, the security of the state, and order in the prison. ACRI’s highly-qualified moderators conduct workshops in an interactive format, based on discussions and analyses of real situations from participants’ experiences. We aim to provide participants with tools to implement human rights values and ethical and humanitarian considerations to best fulfill their professional duties.
With the completion of the program’s pilot stage at two security prisons this summer, ACRI plans to work with the staff of seven more prisons throughout Israel in the coming year, reaching close to 200 security staff.
