A quarter century later, we must recognize that “wars on terror” have undermined Human Rights and stretched the fundamental principles of international law to breaking point. Security and human rights must go hand in hand

United Nations Special Procedures

@UN_SPExperts

 

A quarter century later, we must recognize that “wars on terror” have undermined #HumanRights and stretched the fundamental principles of international law to breaking point. Security and human rights must go hand in hand - UN experts. See full statement: https://ohchr.org/en/statements-

 https://x.com/UN_SPExperts/status/2098433756491059327

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9/11 anniversary: A quarter century of global counter-terrorism has endangered human rights

11 September 2026

On today’s 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the United States of America, we pay tribute to the thousands of victims who lost their lives, to their families, and to the communities whose lives were forever changed by those horrific acts of violence. We equally acknowledge the millions of other victims worldwide of terrorist attacks, excessive counter-terrorism responses, and conflicts in the name of countering terrorism.

Terrorist violence causes profound human suffering, and every State has a duty to protect people from it and to uphold the right to life. We welcome that many governments have assisted and protected the victims of terrorism, and provided remedies, reparation and memorialization. Many countries have also strengthened security measures in ways that respect human rights.

Yet, too many governments have adopted unnecessary and disproportionate responses that have seriously undermined human rights, civil society, civic space, democracy, and the rule of law. Our worldwide monitoring over the past quarter century has exposed the gravest violations of international law in the name of countering terrorism. Wars of aggression. Unlawful occupations. Countless war crimes and crimes against humanity, and plausible allegations of genocide. Assassinations dressed up as “targeted killings”. Torture disguised as “interrogation”. Transboundary abductions, extraordinary renditions, and transnational repression. Secret detention and enforced disappearances. Unfair military trials and special courts, including at Guantanamo Bay. Toxic residues from conflicts have severely harmed human health.

“Wars on terror” have stretched foundational rules of international law beyond their breaking point, including excessive claims about national self-defence and what is permissible under international humanitarian, human rights and refugee law. State violence, foreign intervention, and impunity have counter-productively fuelled terrorism and insecurity locally and even globally, as with the spread of Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant after the 2003 aggression in Iraq.

State violations have also entrenched cycles of violence and impeded the just resolution of protracted conflicts in line with international law, as in the unlawfully occupied Palestinian territory.

Other violations have become almost routine in some countries, including the politicized abuse of overbroad terrorism and “extremism” laws, arbitrary detention, ill-treatment including inadequate health care, denial of fair trial before independent courts, the unjustified imposition of the death penalty and disproportionate penalties, and breaches of privacy and other basic rights. Exceptional temporary laws to address public emergencies have increasingly been made permanent.

Human rights have been further undermined by the arbitrary use of restrictive administrative measures. These include security detention, “control orders”, terrorist and “State terrorist” designations and sanctions (some of which affected whole populations), coercive “re-education”, travel bans, migration controls, citizenship revocation, and internet, communications and online content restrictions.

The use of new and emerging technologies, without adequate safeguards, is a key facilitator of violations. This includes drones, online and offline mass surveillance, spyware, biometric systems, and border security tools. Artificial intelligence and the automation of weapons systems pose heightened risks to the right to life and can undermine accountability. Businesses developing, supplying, or deploying these technologies should ensure that human rights are respected throughout their lifecycle, in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

Civil society has been heavily impacted by counter-terrorism measures, which have been used to target, harass, intimidate, threaten and silence many actors. These include human rights defenders, journalists, dissidents, environmental and land defenders, academics, scientists, artists, non-governmental organizations, social movements, minorities, Indigenous Peoples, peasants and migrants, refugees and asylum seekers. Civic space has been eroded by unjustified restrictions on the rights to freedom of expression, association, peaceful assembly, and the right to take part in public affairs.

Terrorism sanctions, financing laws and “support” offences, and bank de-risking and over-compliance, have led to over-regulation of non-profit organizations, contrary to the risk-based, proportionate approach required under international standards. Such measures have impeded and deterred impartial humanitarian activities in conflict zones, preventing assistance to civilians and undermining economic, social and cultural rights. Security Council and Financial Action Task Force standards have not adequately mitigated these risks and have been misused by some States to restrict civil society.

Counter-terrorism measures have violated the rights of vulnerable groups, including by failing to recognize children as victims of terrorist groups, consider their best interests, provide for their rehabilitation and reintegration, detain them only as last resort and for the shortest possible time, and use specialized juvenile justice processes. Women have experienced differential impacts of counter-terrorism and gendered assumptions about their agency as perpetrators, victims, and participants in counter-terrorism and civil society. Religious, racial and ethnic profiling has victimized some groups.

The Security Council has been part of the problem, by requiring all States to adopt highly intrusive measures without defining terrorism, guaranteeing safeguards, or effectively enforcing international law.

The sheer number, breadth, and invasive nature of counter-terrorism measures has strengthened repression and authoritarianism, in an era of backsliding on human rights and democracy. State violations not only cannot defeat terrorism, but can breed it. They also deny justice to victims of terrorism.

We urge States to review their counter-terrorism laws and practices to comply with international human rights, humanitarian, and refugee law, to establish effective independent oversight and accountability mechanisms to prevent and effectively remedy violations, and to protect and assist victims of terrorism and of unlawful counter-terrorism measures alike.

We also call on States to more meaningfully address the conditions conducive to terrorism under the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy. Trillions of dollars have been spent on highly securitized responses, yet terrorism is more prevalent, in more places, than before 9/11. The world must adequately fund long-term initiatives to prevent terrorism, by prioritizing conflict resolution and peace building, good governance and political inclusion, the rule of law, sustainable development, humanitarian assistance, and human rights for all.

 https://www.ohchr.org/en/statements-and-speeches/2026/09/911-anniversary-quarter-century-global-counter-terrorism-has

"People talk about post-traumatic stress, but for us, there is no post-era; the trauma is ongoing. Keeping our people safe in such a context is incredably difficlut, especially when you see your mother in pieces, your father under rubble, and your friends gone. Such experiences profoundly affect your brain and emotions, and we must help our people to be resilient in this harsh reality." -Rev. Dr. Mitri Raheb of Palestine

Bright Stars of Bethlehem  https://www.instagram.com/bright_stars_of_bethlehem/?g=5

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In Israel’s prisons, torture and death have become a norm that it barely tries to hide: The suffering of Dr Hussam Abu Safiya is no isolated case. The abuse of Palestinian detainees is happening in plain sight, yet nothing changes

A rally in Tel Aviv calling for the release of detained Palestinian doctor Hussam Abu Safiya, 6 July 2026. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

Nesrine Malik in The Guardian  

Mon 13 Jul 2026 01.00 EDT

“This is the end. I don’t see myself surviving. They brought me here to kill me.” These were the words of Dr Hussam Abu Safiya to his lawyer earlier this month. Abu Safiya was the director of the Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza. Eighteen months ago he was seized by Israeli forces and has since been held without charge or trial. He reports being struck with hammers and batons, daily beatings and loss of consciousness. The latest images of him show a much gaunter man than the one who had been the voice of besieged healthcare workers in Gaza, doing their jobs in impossible circumstances.

In June, Abu Safiya was transferred to Rakefet prison, an underground facility first built to hold senior organised crime figures, then closed on the grounds that it was inhumane. It was reopened in late 2023 by the far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. Abu Safiya and the other Palestinian prisoners there never see daylight, a violation of the Geneva conventions. Across the Palestinian territories and Israel, about 3,500 prisoners like him are held under “administrative detention” that can be renewed every six months, indefinitely. Nearly 200 of them are children. Once a Palestinian is detained under these rules, they are essentially abducted by the state.

“Real hell” is what is experienced once detained. Ali al-Samoudi, a Palestinian journalist, was released earlier this year, unrecognisable. He had lost 60kg, about half of his body weight. “Prison today is hell in every sense of the word,” he told CNN. “Everything they practised with us was punishment and revenge.”

The scale of abuse, torture and death in Israeli prisons is well documented... READ MORE https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jul/13/israel-prison-torture-death-hussam-abu-safiya-palestine

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“The past two and a half years have been one of daily horror and fear as Palestinians have watched our families and friends massacred, starved and tortured,” she said, describing this period as the darkest chapter in Palestinian history since 1948: British Palestinians feel ‘gaslit’ and unable to speak out, says leading activist

Ahead of Nakba march, Sara Husseini says many feel they are being treated as suspects rather than victims of mass suffering

Aamna Mohdin Community affairs correspondent

Sat 16 May 2026 01.00 EDT

 

‘We feel a great deal of solidarity from the British public.’ A Together for Palestine march in central London in March. Photograph: Maja Smiejkowska/PA

British Palestinians feel unable to speak openly about Israel’s war on Gaza, the director of the British Palestinian Committee has said, amid what campaigners believe is a growing climate of hostility around Palestinian identity and activism in the UK.

Some were afraid to wear Palestinian symbols at work or display Arabic jewellery and keffiyehs in public, Sara Husseini said.

“We have many documented reports of Palestinians and allies being silenced or punished for wearing Palestinian symbols, watermelon pins, or speaking about the genocide,” she said. “Many colleagues across all kinds of sectors feel they are being gaslit while friends and families are being massacred back home.”

Speaking before Saturday’s national march in London commemorating the 78th anniversary of the Nakba (“catastrophe”) – the displacement of at least 700,000 Palestinians during the creation of Israel in 1948 – Husseini said many Palestinians felt they were being treated not as victims of mass suffering, but as suspects whose grief had become politicised.

“Cruelty is the word I would use, particularly for colleagues who are from Gaza or have family there, knowing these atrocities are being inflicted on their loved ones day in, day out,” Husseini said.

“And then being effectively told: not only are we not going to acknowledge that this is happening to you, we’re going to disbelieve you, interrogate you, stop you from speaking about it, and if you do speak, we’re going to paint you as the problem.”... READ MORE  https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/may/16/british-palestinians-feel-unable-speak-out-sara-husseini

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The terrifying reality of life under US sanctions by Brian Feeny in The Irish Times... & Francesca Albanese responds "Surely my life is not easy. But it is nothing compared to that of the Palestinians under Israeli Apartheid, who continue to be genocided and tortured. With or without sanctions, I will not stop standing for justice. Together we can and we will. #UNA"

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/brian-feeney-the-terrifying-reality-of-life-under-us-sanctions/ar-AA21agBN
 The Irish News 

Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt

@FranceskAlbs

 

Surely my life is not easy. But it is nothing compared to that of the Palestinians under Israeli Apartheid, who continue to be genocided and tortured. With or without sanctions, I will not stop standing for justice. Together we can and we will. #UNA

 https://x.com/FranceskAlbs/status/2045443737916940457

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These are torture camps. There are hundreds of children among them. The world is watching, and doing nothing.

 Munther Isaac منذر اسحق

@MuntherIsaac

These are torture camps. There are hundreds of children among them. The world is watching, and doing nothing.

 

 https://x.com/MuntherIsaac/status/2036328255460876418

 

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B'Tselem בצלם بتسيلم

 

@btselem

 

As of March 2026, some 9,446 Palestinians are held in Israeli prisons; 4,691 of them are under administrative detention, imprisoned without charge, trial, or the ability to defend themselves. 

 

Even during the illegal and deadly Israeli-American attack on Iran, Israel continues to operate a network of torture camps for Palestinian prisoners from north to south, where they are subjected to systematic abuse, including physical and psychological violence, inhuman conditions, starvation and denial of medical treatment. 

 

84 identified Palestinians, including one minor, have died in Israeli torture camps over the last two years, and there is grave concern that the real number is higher. 

 

This policy persists with the full support of Israel’s political establishment, judicial system, prison authorities and media. The Israel Prison Service and the Minister for National Security have publicly bragged about the harsh conditions imposed on Palestinian prisoners. 

 

These torture camps are part of the planned, extensive assault Israel is waging against Palestinian society, intended to break down and destroy Palestinians as a group. Link to our report “Living Hell” >>  https://www.btselem.org/publications/202601_living_hell