A/HRC/20/32 2011, followed by admission of Palestine as a member of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). 6. It is clear that the views of the refugee communities, while diverging in emphasis from the opinions of Palestinians living in the occupied Palestinian territory, are influential in determining public opinion within the occupied territory, due to the widespread links of close family and community ties. The acceptance or rejection of alternate political approaches or outcomes by Palestinian refugees living outside of the occupied Palestinian territory is one of the key determinants as to whether Palestinians inside the occupied territory are likely to accept or reject a negotiated outcome. II. Administrative detention and hunger strikes 7. It was the Special Rapporteur’s intention to review the treatment of Palestinians from the occupied Palestinian territory being detained in Israeli prisons as a sequel to the analysis of this dimension of occupation contained in a prior report (A/66/358). What was somewhat unanticipated was the urgency emerging in the occupied Palestinian territory on this issue, requiring the Special Rapporteur to focus even greater attention on the Israeli practice of holding Palestinians under administrative detention during which evidence, if it exists at all, is held in secret, no charges are filed, and no trials held. The number of detainees in administrative detention rose from 286 in September 2011 to 309 in January 2012.2 What is now called ―administrative detention‖ was formerly known as ―internment‖. Internment was a colonial procedure used to remove individuals from society even if no criminal charges were made. Administrative detention has been relied upon by a large number of countries, especially in recent years, to detain terrorist suspects who are alleged to pose a threat to domestic security, for whom there is either insufficient evidence or the evidence of supposed criminality cannot be made available without exposing sensitive sources of intelligence or illegal practices (such as torture). The practice is highly controversial, and the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and respected human rights organizations such as Amnesty International allege that the practice is unacceptable from a human rights viewpoint, as it is so often abused to imprison innocent persons who are prisoners of conscience, opponents of policy or organizers of non-violent protests.3 On the basis of careful examination of highprofile targets of such detention procedures, it seems to be mainly used by Israel against individuals not engaged in violent activities, and hence they are inappropriately held in administrative detention even taking into account the highly questionable rationale of a severe and imminent security threat the nature of which is not disclosed. 8. The current Israeli reliance on administrative detention has become particularly controversial for a series of reasons: frequent use and prolonged confinement of people who seemingly do not pose security threats; exceedingly harsh treatment amounting to cruel and unusual punishment accompanying arrest, interrogation and detention in violation of human rights and international humanitarian law obligations; and conflict with fundamental obligations of an occupying power to uphold the well-being and normalcy of the civilian population living under occupation, as prescribed by the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (Fourth Geneva Convention). 4 There is 2 3 4 B’Tselem, detention statistics, available from www.btselem.org/administrative_detention/statistics. See, for example, reports of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention A/HRC/4/40 (para. 41) and A/HRC/10/21 (para. 54). See also Amnesty International’s analysis at www.amnesty.org/en/ai_search?keywords=administrative%20detention&op=Search&form_id=searc h_theme_form&form_token=48e71c33a438fc234e25f6718caa142c. The basic profile of the use by Israel of administrative detention during the years 2011-2012 has been summarized by B’Tselem and is available from www.btselem.org/administrative_detention/statistics. 5