Mental health impact on children of forcible home invasions

17 September, 2021

Just published in BMJ Paediatrics Open is an editorial on the impact on children of the forcible home invasions in the Occupied Palestinian territories, carried out for often unjustified reasons by the Israeli Defence Forces

https://bmjpaedsopen.bmj.com/content/5/1/e001062

This study by Physicians for Human Rights Israel with two other human rights organisations,

'documents the grievous mental health repercussions, including on children, of the Israeli policy of forcible invasions by the military into the homes of West Bank Palestinian families. The report, titled ‘Life Exposed1<https://bmjpaedsopen.bmj.com/content/5/1/e001062#ref-1>’ is based on 158 interviews of Palestinians who experienced home invasions, as well as over 40 soldiers who carried them out. Following 3 years of joint work, the report documents how these invasions, which number more than 250 a month and are primarily carried out between midnight and 05:00, traumatise and cause harm to Palestinians adults and children and effectively serve to intimidate and maintain control over the Palestinian population. At a time when there are increasing concerns globally about violence perpetrated against children, the political goals of this tactic, its frequency, the adverse mental health impact on children as well as lack of available studies until now means that it bears close examination and criticism.'

The editorial provides further evidence of the grim and prolonged impact of the occupation on the lives of Palestinian children.

Tony Waterston

CHIFA profile: Tony Waterston is a retired consultant paediatrician who worked mainly in the community in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. He spent 6 years working in Zambia and Zimbabwe and directed the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health Diploma in Palestinian Child Health teaching programme in the occupied Palestinian territories. He was an Editor of the Journal of Tropical Pediatrics and is on the Executive Committee of the International Society for Social Pediatrics. His academic interests are child poverty, advocacy for child health and children's rights. He is currently the lead moderator of CHIFA (HIFA's sister forum on child health and rights). He is also a member of the HIFA Steering Group.

Tony.Waterston AT newcastle.ac.uk