A/HRC/2/5 page 8 9. Writing in Haaretz on 7 July 2006, the Israeli columnist Gideon Levy summed up the situation in the following language: “The Israel Defence Forces departure from Gaza … did almost nothing to change the living conditions for the residents of the Strip. Gaza is still a prison and its inhabitants are still doomed to live in poverty and oppression. Israel closes them off from the sea, the air and land, except for a limited safety valve at the Rafah crossing. They cannot visit their relatives in the West Bank or look for work in Israel, upon which the Gazan economy has been dependent for some forty years. Sometimes goods can be transported, sometimes not. Gaza has no chance of escaping its poverty under these conditions. Nobody will invest in it, nobody can develop it, nobody can feel free in it. Israel left the cage, threw away the keys and left the residents to their bitter fate. Now, less than a year after the disengagement, it is going back, with violence and force.” 10. Even before the start of “Operation Summer Rains” Israel had already tightened its control of Gaza in response to the election of Hamas to the Palestinian Authority in January 2006. I visited Gaza on 11 June 2006. For security reasons, I was not permitted to stay overnight, as had previously been my practice during visits to OPT. I visited the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Gaza and spoke with the director of hospital services and senior medical practitioners. It was clear that the hospital services faced a crisis resulting from the non-payment of staff salaries and the restrictions placed on the supply of medicines and vaccines through the Karni crossing. It seemed clear to me that the Government of Israeli had embarked upon a siege in order to bring about regime change. In the process little attention was being paid to human rights, as shelling and sonic booms violated the fundamental rights to life and human dignity, and even less attention was paid to the constraints of international humanitarian law; it was already clear that collective punishment was to be the instrument used to bring about regime change. 11. On 25 June 2006 a group of Palestinian militants attacked a military base near the Israeli-Egyptian border, which left two Palestinians and two IDF soldiers dead. In retreating, they took Corporal Gilad Shalit with them as captive. They demanded the release of the women and children in Israeli jails in return for his release. This act, together with the continued Qassam rocket fire into Israel, unleashed a savage response from the Government of Israeli. In the first place, it arrested 8 Hamas Cabinet ministers and 26 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council in Ramallah. At the time of writing this report, most of them remained in detention. While Israel claims that they are being held because of their support for terrorist activities, it is difficult to resist the notion that they are being held as hostages, in violation of article 34 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilians in Time of War (Fourth Geneva Convention). This impression is confirmed by the debate within the Government over what to do with them. The Shin Bet security service suggested holding them as bargaining chips under the Unlawful Combatants Law. It seems, however, that the Attorney-General, Menachem Mazuz, has insisted that legal proceedings be initiated against them for membership in a terrorist organization (see Haaretz, 30 June 2006). The issue of the arrest of members of Hamas has been aggravated by the arrest of Aziz Dweik, Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, on 5 August 2006 and reports that he has been injured in the course of interrogation.