A/HRC/2/5 page 6 I. INTRODUCTION 1. I visited the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) and Israel from 9 to 17 June 2006 in order to compile information for my report to the Human Rights Council at its forthcoming session in September 2006. Shortly after I left OPT a serious crisis erupted in Gaza following the capture by Palestinian militants of an Israeli soldier, Corporal Gilad Shalit. The Israeli reaction to this development prompted the convening of a special session of the Council to discuss the situation in OPT. At the special session, held on 5 and 6 July 2006, the Council decided to send a fact-finding mission headed by myself to OPT so that I might report on the most recent developments. In order to carry out this mission it was necessary to obtain the consent of the Government of Israel. The Government, however, declined to agree to a visit by the fact-finding mission. The present report is therefore written to apprise the Council of the situation affecting human rights in the region in the context of my visit and subsequent developments in OPT which gave rise to the request for a fact-finding mission. Inevitably, as I was not able to visit the region in July, information on these developments up to 9 August 2006 has been obtained from secondary sources - press reports, reports of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), United Nations publications, etc. 2. During my mission I visited Jerusalem, Gaza, villages in the vicinity of Jerusalem which have been seriously affected by the construction of the Wall, Ramallah, Hebron and communities in the South Hebron Hills, Bethlehem and the Wall near Rachel’s Tomb, the village of Wallaja, where house demolitions have occurred, the Jordan Valley, including Jericho, and communities whose human rights are affected by Israeli policies and practices, Nablus, including the Balata refugee camp, the village of Jayyous on the perimeter of the Wall and farming communities living close to the Wall, and checkpoints around the city of Nablus and roads in its vicinity. 3. During the visit I spoke with a wide range of persons, both Palestinian and Israeli, about violations of human rights and international humanitarian law. I delivered a lecture at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem sponsored by the Minerva Centre for Human Rights and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). The lecture, which was attended by more than 100 persons, examined controversial questions of humanitarian law relating to the conflict in OPT. Unfortunately, I had no contact with Israeli officials as the Government of Israel does not recognize my mandate. The Government was, however, aware of my visit and placed no obstacles in the way of the visit. 4. The eruption of violence in Gaza following the capture of Corporal Shalit and the arrest of members of the Palestinian Legislative Council and the Palestinian Authority (see paragraph 11 below) was followed by Israel’s invasion of Lebanon and large-scale violence in Lebanon, Israel and Gaza. It is not the purpose of this report to comment on events in Lebanon and along Israel’s northern borders, as that falls outside my mandate. It will, however, fully examine the situation in Gaza. It should be mentioned that the events in Lebanon to a large extent have overshadowed violence in Gaza and along its borders. 5. In the present report “the Wall” is used instead of “barrier” or “fence”. This term was carefully and deliberately used by the International Court of Justice in its 2004 advisory opinion on the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory of 9 July 2006. I see no reason to depart from this language.