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Summary: The bulletin is published on a bi-monthly basis highlighting trends and patterns in grave violations against children during the reporting period.
Since 2007, a UNICEF-led working group has consolidated efforts to monitor and report on grave violations against children in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt). Members of the working group include: Al Mezan Centre for Human Rights, Save the Children, DCI-Palestine, B’Tselem, Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, War Child Holland, OCHA, OHCHR, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNRWA and WHO. The violations that are being monitored include killing and injuries, arrest and detention, ill-treatment and torture, recruitment and use of children by armed forces and groups, attacks on schools and hospitals, displacement, and denial of humanitarian access including access to health and education. In 2010, grave violations continued to be committed against children in the occupied Palestinian territory. Eleven Palestinian children were killed and 360 injured in Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. No Israeli children were killed but two were injured. Palestinian children continued to be detained and subjected to ill-treatment, and in some cases torture, during arrest and interrogations by Israeli security forces. In East Jerusalem, search and arrest operations involving children as young as seven years old intensified in the Silwan neighbourhood, and child casualties increased at the end of the year as a result of the confrontations between private armed guards, hired by the Israeli Ministry of Housing to protect Israeli settlers, and local residents (unarmed). In Gaza, Palestinian children were shot at by Israeli security forces while collecting rubble in or near the Buffer Zone, hoping to earn some money to help their poverty-stricken families. Unknown armed Palestinian men attacked UNRWA summer schools and the Hamas authorities closed a youth organisation providingpsychosocial and vocational support for more than 60,000 Gaza children and youth. During September and October, one of the key concerns was the dramatic increase in child casualties in East Jerusalem with an eighty-five per cent increase from the last reporting period. Twenty-six Palestinian children were injured and one 15-month-old baby killed in Al-Isawiya as a result of the confrontations between private armed guards, hired by the Israeli Ministry of Housing to protect Israeli settlers, and local residents (unarmed) in the neighbourhood of Silwan. In addition, 23 children between the ages of 10-17 were arrested in Silwan during search and arrest operations. Tensions in Silwan have increased in recent months, particularly after the publication of a master plan for the neighbourhood, which anticipates the displacement of hundreds of Palestinian residents living in houses without building permits. During the reporting period, 38 Palestinian children were injured. The injured children include 37 boys and one girl. No Israeli children were reported injured or killed in the same period. Thirty-two children were injured by Israeli forces, including 15 children in relation to Palestinian civil society demonstrations and 13 children related to military activities. Five children were injured in incidents involving Israeli settlers including three injuries caused directly by settlers and two injuries by Israeli forces. Three children were injured in unexploded ordnance (UXO) related incidents. Further information: