Meezaan Organization for Human Rights in Nazareth has published a new book entitled Codified Repression: Human Rights and Political Violations against the Detainees of the Dignity Uprising (2021): Documentation and Legal Analysis.
The book, written in Arabic and to be translated later into English, spans 124 pages. It offers an in-depth analytical reading of the legal and human rights experience endured by hundreds of detainees during the events of the “Dignity Uprising” in May 2021. It was prepared by researcher Saher Ghazawi, with contributions in preparation and editing by lawyers Omar Khamaiseh and Mustafa Suheil Mahamid.
The publication reviews the wave of mass arrests that targeted Arab citizens during the uprising, highlighting the severe violations in interrogation and detention processes. It documents testimonies from Arab lawyers regarding the detention conditions and the breaches that accompanied them. The book also provides a deep analysis of the unprecedented court rulings issued against the detainees, presenting a comparative perspective that clearly exposes the disparity in judicial treatment between Arabs and Jews. It underscores how legal instruments were employed to entrench racial supremacy and reinforce the “Jewishness of the State” at the expense of justice and equality.
Additionally, the book examines the official Israeli narrative of the events from a security and political perspective, including the Attorney General’s report. It analyzes the mechanisms through which legal language was mobilized to justify discriminatory and exclusionary policies. The book highlights how the “Dignity Uprising” marked a pivotal moment that revealed the limits of the formal citizenship of Palestinian Arabs in Israel and the structural role of the judiciary in consolidating systemic discrimination.
This work serves as both a documentary and analytical reference aimed at raising public awareness and engaging in legal, media, and political advocacy to hold Israel accountable at the international level. It constitutes an important source for researchers and institutions concerned with justice and human rights.
The book notes that the included table documents only 83 cases among the hundreds of Arab detainees indicted in connection with the May 2021 events, stressing that the overall number is much larger. This is attributed to several factors, including the ongoing nature of some cases without final verdicts, the refusal of some families to document their children’s cases, as well as purely criminal files or cases involving minors subject to legal restrictions that prevented publication.
This publication adds to a series of legal and human rights reports released by Meezaan Organization in both Arabic and English.
👉 Download and read the book here
👉 See the full list of Meezaan’s publications
Meezaan Organization for Human Rights – Nazareth
Thursday, 25 September 2025
