B2 The Daily of Geopolitical Europe. News. Files. Reflections. Reports

Israel PalestineMissions OperationsReport

Palestinian police train

© NGV / B2 in Tulkarem
© NGV / B2 in Tulkarem

(BRUSSELS2, in Tulkarem and Ramallah) The civilian police must be trained on a daily basis, both in terms of incident intervention techniques and judicial police or "delicate" arrests.

This Wednesday (*), we have an appointment with the police officers of Tulkaren — one of the Palestinian towns in the west of the West Bank — to take part in a "refreshment" session for around thirty police officers. Training all the more important as the crime rate in the West Bank being quite low, the police do not always have the opportunity to confront every day all the situations that ordinary judicial police face (see below below). The updating of knowledge involves a theoretical session to refresh knowledge - which takes place at the "central police station" in Tulkarem - and a series of practical exercises very close to the accommodation of the teams of the Special Police Force (SPF).

An imperative: secure the crime scene

The instructor recalls the fundamentals of a first intervention team – the equivalent of the police rescue teams in France. It is necessary to give first aid to the victim, to warn to obtain reinforcements, to secure (the specialists will say "freeze") the scene of the crime, to take the photos, to prevent with a cord that people, curious people arrive at the scene of the crime . " The most important thing is to protect yourself, to prevent one of you from being injured.. The dialogue begins with the instructor. " What if you don't have a cord? ". Answer: we use what we have on hand, small stones if we are outside; close not only a room but the whole apartment if you are inside. " Who takes command? It is normally the most senior officer in rank present at the crime scene who must take action even if senior officers arrive later. " It is totally forbidden to go into the scene. And even the junior officer must note if there is the slightest person who touches someone. » The session continues...

Mentors not trainers

The Europeans moved, quite discreetly, to the back of the room. They listen and write down what is said, with an interpreter translating what the Palestinian instructor is saying (for those who don't understand Arabic). They do not intervene throughout the presentation. It is after the training and the exercise, during the debriefing, that the experience feedback takes place between the European and Palestinian trainers. " We are not here to provide training — one of the instructors explains to me in a low voice. We only serve as mentors, to check that everything is going well. » If, at the beginning, the EUPOL Copps mission provided training directly, it has now moved on to a second stage, less visible but just as important. " We have no vocation to remain in aeternam. We have to liaise with the Palestinian police. »

Technical exercises

Three practical scenarios are organized today: the arrival of an intervention team at a crime scene and the first elements of the judicial police, the arrest of a suspect by the SPF - the intervention forces - and a road accident, caused by an accomplice. " Crime, street crime as we know it in our countries is at a relatively low rate in the West Bank explains a European officer. Hence the need for regular exercises to maintain a certain technicality and ability to intervene at crime scenes » ultimately rare in reality.

A fairly traditional way of life

This relative security is explained by the still traditional way of life in the West Bank. Palestinian society often remains essentially rural, where family solidarity is not an empty word and social control over public life is quite strong. " Here everything is known quickly ». However, the West Bank is not immune to the common lot of road accidents, which are very frequent and often fatal, as well as organized crime. A high-flying delinquency, followers of all kinds of trafficking (drugs, false papers, high-tech products, etc.) and who skilfully take advantage of the particularly complex political situation to escape all laws.

1st exercise: a crime scene

At the crime scene, it is Jérôme Buaillon, a commander of the French police, seconded by the DDSP (Departmental Directorate of Public Security) of Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine), who officiates. He built a fairly simple scenario: a person apparently committed suicide. A suicide note, in Arabic, was intentionally left. There are overturned chairs. A knife is lying on the ground, as well as a cell phone. The objective of the exercise is twofold: for the team of 1st intervention Securing the crime scene — “freezing” it in police terms — collecting evidence, while waiting for the PJ team. The 2e challenge will be to send a first report to the prosecutor. Jerôme, the French commander gives the starting signal to the exercise: “over”. After securing the scene, the specialized PJ team takes over. She will have numbers on each of the traces or exhibits: overturned chairs, traces of blood, mobile phone, letter.

Save material!

At one point, Jerome interrupts the exercise. Through the interpreter, he explains: Do not use all the material, pretend. A recommendation that may seem bizarre in this type of exercise but has a very real, economic basis. « The Palestinian police have little identification material, powder. It's useless to waste it. » Equipment is moreover one of the main challenges facing this relatively young body, which was created after the Oslo agreements in the mid-1990s. For DNA research, there is no only one equipped laboratory, at the University of Ramallah. And moving her on the crime ties isn't easy. Israel generally blocks imports of this type of material. It is one of the roles of the mission of the EUPOL Copps mission to find partners – States, members of the European Union or not (Canada, United States, etc.), or other organizations (foundations, organizations organizations) – willing to provide such equipment. "We are not looking to have the latest equipment, which they could not use in the end, but equipment that has already been tested in our countries and which they can, without worry, easily maintain and renew".

Arrest the suspect gently!

Second element of the exercise: a “muscular” intervention in an urban environment to arrest a suspect. It is the elements of the "Special force" (SPF) of the Palestinian police, which are required. The SPF has a dual role: maintaining order on the public highway – the equivalent of our mobile gendarmes or CRS – and special interventions – which require a little more technical expertise and equipment.

First element: the summation. Through a loudspeaker, the suspect is summoned to surrender. This may appear a detail. But that is not one. " This was one of the contributions of the training “explains one of the European police officers. In the region, " it is not really in the tradition to obtain the surrender of a suspect gently without the use of force ". And the Palestinians had to get on with it. The intervention taking place in an urban environment, it is also necessary to take care of any collateral damage, to keep onlookers or curious people away.

Then comes the intervention, in a classic unfolding that has nothing to envy to European practices. The intervention team arrived in several vans and arranges itself in an arc around the building. Men placed in cover, sheltered behind their vehicles. And others who progress towards the building. The police are equipped with dummy weapons. At the start signal, the front door is rammed with a portable battering ram. Then, they progress inside the building to seize the suspect, who is handcuffed and embarked.

« However, we must be careful not to make too many comparisons with what is happening here. – warns the head of the European mission “EUPOL Copps”, Rodolphe Mauget. " If we want to compare the Palestinian police, it is to the forces of other countries in the region, to the Jordanian police or to the Egyptian police. And, in that light, the Palestinian police bear comparison, he said. " We are on the right track, despite the difficulties and political constraints. This takes time. But the professionalism of the staff is very real. And the direction of the reforms undertaken clearly points in the right direction »

(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde)

(*) report made on 8/4/2015 - published in a short version in Ouest-France.fr

Nicolas Gros Verheyde

Chief editor of the B2 site. Graduated in European law from the University of Paris I Pantheon Sorbonne and listener to the 65th session of the IHEDN (Institut des Hautes Etudes de la Défense Nationale. Journalist since 1989, founded B2 - Bruxelles2 in 2008. EU/NATO correspondent in Brussels for Sud-Ouest (previously West-France and France-Soir).

s2Member®