UN Official Urges Israel Free Jailed Palestinians
Reuters
March 23, 2005 
The New York Times
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GENEVA (Reuters) - A United Nations human rights investigator has called on Israel to take a ``bold step'' toward securing peace by meeting Palestinian demands to release thousands of prisoners.
John Dugard, U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, also urged the Jewish state on Wednesday to stop building new settlements in the West Bank.
Dugard, who visited the territories and Israel last month, spoke to reporters a day after addressing the annual U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
Libya, on behalf of Arab states, has presented resolutions assailing Israel at the 53-member forum, where Israel and its main ally the United States object to Dugard's ``one-sided'' mandate.
Dugard said he recognized ``important moves in the right direction'' by Israel, including the recent release of 500 Palestinian prisoners and a decision to disengage from the Gaza Strip where 8,500 Jewish settlers live in fortified enclaves.
But Israel had been ``timid'' in its approach to demands for the release of 7,000 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, a ``top priority'' for the Palestinian Authority, he told reporters.
``What is required of Israel is a bold step, of the kind taken by other transitional societies, which have released prisoners in order to further peace,'' Dugard said in a speech on Tuesday.
Dugard, a South African jurist, told reporters on Wednesday his country's former apartheid regime had agreed to release political prisoners on a massive scale ``as the price paid for peace.''
Israel has previously refused to release prisoners ``with blood on their hands,'' but political sources said this month Israel had agreed to study Palestinian demands to free people convicted of involvement in attacks.
A de facto truce between Israel and Palestinian militant groups since February is expected to strengthen Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's hand in trying to persuade Israel to free more Palestinians and hand back more West Bank territory.
``But the settlements in the West Bank continue to grow in number and in size ... I believe that they are an important obstacle in the way of the peace process,'' Dugard said.
``I think time is limited and Israel has to address the whole issue of settlements,'' he added, noting that 150 settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem had some 400,000 inhabitants.
Dugard said Palestinian patience was ``not unlimited.''
``If Israel doesn't address some of the key issues, Palestinian patience will run out and the militants will once more resume their militant activities and once more threaten Israeli security,'' he declared.
He also urged the international community to pressure Israel to dismantle the wall being built on occupied territory, ruled illegal by the U.N.'s International Court of Justice.
Israel says it needs the wall to keep out Palestinian bombers.
Former U.S. Senator Rudy Boschwitz, head of the U.S. delegation, called for the Palestinian Authority to establish an environment ``free from the threat of terror'' and for Israel to freeze settlement activity.
Boschwitz also criticized the rights forum for its ``one-sided anti-Israel resolutions'' each year which he said undermined the credibility of the United Nations. Voting is due near the end of the six-week session which closes on April 22.