Photo: Ramallah Friends School
In the early morning hours of October 18, 2022, then 16-year-old Shadi Khoury was rousted from his bed and beaten by Israeli forces who had entered his home to arrest him. Pictures taken at the scene showed a trail of blood marking where he was dragged out of his house. For 41 days Shadi was interrogated without charge or trial and eventually was placed under house arrest. His case in court was repeatedly delayed, leaving his family and friends in an ongoing state of anguish and disarray. Shadi has appeared in an Israeli court 41 times. At every session, his lawyer stood firm in his defense, exposing contradictions and serious flaws in the case.
Despite no credible evidence presented by the prosecution and consistent testimony by Shadi that he was not involved in any illegal activity, on September 8, 2025 Shadi was convicted by Israeli military court on unsubstantiated charges of participating in a protest. Sentencing is scheduled for January 20, 2026.
Shadi was a student at the Ramallah Friends School, a school established over 150 years ago that teaches Quaker values of peace and nonviolence. His mother Rania describes him as warm, shy, and confident. He loves music and sports, especially soccer.. “Shadi is strong and resilient,” said his mother this month, “He remains confident. Yet he has endured a traumatic experience that will never be forgotten. This was not an isolated incident. What he endured will remain deeply etched in his memory and will inevitably shape his outlook on life and his future.”
Shadi is not alone in his experience of abuses. Since 2000 an estimated 13,000 Palestinian children between the ages of 12 and 17 in the occupied Palestinian territory have been detained, prosecuted, and incarcerated by the Israeli army. Israeli forces seriously escalated their campaign to detain Palestinian children without charge or trial in 2025, according to documentation collected by Defense for Children International Palestine (DCIP). Month after month, the population and proportion of Palestinian child detainees in administrative detention (held without charges) grew to all-time high record levels. As of September 2025, 350 Palestinian children were held in Israeli detention.
2025 also saw the first Palestinian child to ever die inside Israeli prisons, according to documentation collected by DCIP. 17-year-old Walid Khalid Abdullah Ahmad died inside Megiddo prison and his autopsy findings showed extreme muscle and fat wasting, untreated infections, dehydration, scabies, and blunt-force trauma—clear evidence that Walid was systematically starved and abused for months until he collapsed and died.
“Israeli forces killed, maimed, tortured, starved, abducted and displaced Palestinian children every single day in 2025,” said Khaled Quzmar, general director at DCIP. “There was not a single moment of safety for any Palestinian child, which is the culmination of decades of impunity enjoyed by Israeli forces and authorities, who have faced absolutely no consequences for their crimes against children.”
AFSC worked to change this situation for years through its No Way to Treat a Child Campaign (NWTTAC). The campaign led by AFSC and Defense for Children International – Palestine focused on ending Israel’s military occupation and the systematic mistreatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military court and detention system. Like Shadi, other young people are often dragged from their homes in the middle of the night by armed soldiers or police, suffering physical and emotional abuse with lasting repercussions. Of the 470 Palestinian child ex-detainees interviewed by Save the Children, 80% said they were beaten in detention. In 2015, UNICEF said that Palestinian children are systematically abused in Israeli military detention, and some of the treatment they face amounts to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment according to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention against Torture.
Palestinians, including children, are systematically abused in the Israeli military court system. They are interrogated for days without access to legal counsel. Interrogations are conducted under violence or the threat of violence and other intimidation tactics. Confessions are forced, and often detainees will be forced to sign confessions in Hebrew even if they cannot read what they are signing. According to past documents released by the Israeli military and analyses by Israeli human rights groups, 99.7% of Palestinians tried in the military court system are convicted.
Palestinian children should be in school and safely at home with their families, not shackled in an abusive military detention system.
It is also important to place the abuse and detention of Shadi in the context of increasing Israeli violence in the West Bank. Over the past year, Israeli settlers have carried out more than 1,000 attacks on Palestinians—including assaults on children and destroying homes, property, and agricultural land. Today, settler attacks continue daily under full Israeli military protection. In 2025 alone, Israeli forces and settlers killed 671 Palestinians in the West Bank, including 129 children. More than 40,000 Palestinians have also been forcibly displaced from their homes through Israeli military violence. Entire neighborhoods, roads, and other critical infrastructure have been destroyed.
AFSC calls for the charges against Shadi be dropped and the release of all Palestinian children held in Israeli military detention. Our hope is that Shadi’s case will call attention to the need to end the systematic abuse of Palestinian children’s rights in Israel’s military court and detention system.
This system is a mechanism used to enforce Israel’s occupation and apartheid policies. Shadi’s release and accountability for military court abuses is not enough. “Children’s rights are violated every day in Palestine, without accountability and with utter disregard for all international conventions and legal protections,” said Shadi’s mother Rania. The U.S. and other international actors must also hold Israel accountable for its systematic abuses of Palestinian rights. True accountability will be demonstrated when all U.S. military and other aid enabling Israeli military occupation and genocide ends, and Palestinian rights to freedom and dignity are respected.
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