Palestinians Demand Probe of Israeli Organ-Harvesting

JERUSALEM (Dec. 21) – Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad today called for a thorough investigation after Israel admitted that its forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies, including Palestinians, in the 1990s.

"It is high time for the world to realize and punish Israel for its breaches of human rights regulations," Palestinian government spokesman Ghassan Khatib said in an interview.

But so far reaction within Israel has been muted, and the man responsible for the practice, Dr. Jehuda Hiss, remains chief pathologist at Israel's leading forensic institute in the town of Abu Kabir.

Over the weekend Israel Television's Channel Two broadcast a previously unaired interview conducted by an American academic in 2000 with Hiss, who then headed the institute. In the interview, Hiss said that Israel harvested corneas, skin, bones and heart valves from the bodies of Israeli soldiers, Israeli citizens, Palestinians and foreign workers, often without permission from the families.

Israeli television viewers heard Hiss describe how doctors would try to cover up the removal of the corneas. "We'd glue the eyelids shut," he said. "We wouldn't take corneas from families we know would open the eyelids."

Palestinians have frequently charged that Israel has harvested organs of Palestinians killed in fighting with Israeli troops – a claim that Israel has vehemently denied until now. In an attempt to limit the damage from the weekend's broadcast, a spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces said that "these activities last occurred more than 10 years ago during the 1990s and have not recurred since."

There have been questions of irregularities at the Abu Kabir forensic institute before. Hiss, who became director of the institute in 1988, was dismissed from that post in 2004 over allegations of organ misuse. But Israel's attorney general dropped all criminal charges against him and he still works as Israel's chief pathologist.

The revelations did not cause much of a stir in Israel, as the country remained focused on whether the government will go ahead with a deal to release 1,000 Palestinian prisoners, including dozens who were convicted of murdering Israelis, in exchange for a captured Israeli soldier who has been held in Gaza for more than three years.

Many who learned of the former practice expressed outrage, but said they were not surprised.

"I'm horrified but I must say it's comforting that it's not only Palestinians whose organs were taken," said Galia Golan, a professor of international relations and a longtime peace activist. "The real problem is what it shows about the level of morality in Israeli society. Here the Palestinians were just as much victims as the citizens of Israel."

Last summer, a Swedish newspaper published a report claiming that Israeli soldiers killed Palestinians for their organs. That report sparked a diplomatic controversy between Israel and Sweden. These latest reports do not substantiate those claims but they are likely to deepen Palestinians' suspicions of Israel.

Palestinian analysts say the revelations come as the international community is already growing more critical of Israel.

"The world is finally beginning to question Israel's policies toward the Palestinians," said Palestinian scholar and columnist Samih Shabeeb. "First the British people decided to boycott produce from the West Bank settlements. Now the body parts issue will spark a lot of protest from around the world, and Palestinians should use this."