Israel is increasingly relying on facial recognition in the
occupied West Bank to track Palestinians and restrict their passage through key
checkpoints, according to a new report, a sign of how
artificial-intelligence-powered surveillance can be used against an ethnic
group.
اضافة اعلان
At high-fenced checkpoints in Hebron, Palestinians stand in
front of facial recognition cameras before being allowed to cross. As their
faces are scanned, the software — known as Red Wolf — uses a color-coded system
of green, yellow, and red to guide soldiers on whether to let the person go,
stop them for questioning, or arrest them, according to the report by Amnesty
International. When the technology fails to identify someone, soldiers train
the system by adding their personal information to the database.
Israel has historically restricted the freedom of movement
of Palestinians, but technological advances are giving authorities new tools.
It is the latest example of the global spread of mass surveillance systems,
which rely on AI to learn to identify the faces of people based on large stores
of images.
In Hebron and East Jerusalem, the technology focuses almost
entirely on Palestinians, according to Amnesty’s report, marking a new way to
automate the control of interior boundaries that separate the lives of
Palestinians and Israelis. Amnesty called the process “automated apartheid”.
“These databases and tools exclusively record the data of
Palestinians,” said the report, which is based on accounts by former Israeli
soldiers and Palestinians who live in the surveilled areas, as well as field
visits to observe the technology’s use in affected territories.
Israeli occupation forces, which plays a central role in the
occupied territories of the West Bank, said in a statement that it carries out
“necessary security and intelligence operations, while making significant
efforts to minimize harm to the Palestinian population’s routine activity.”
On facial recognition, it added, “Naturally, we cannot refer
to operational and intelligence capabilities.”
Government use of facial recognition technology to so
explicitly target a single ethnic group is rare. In China, companies have made
algorithms that sought to identify minorities as they passed by the country’s
ubiquitous cameras. China’s government has also used facial recognition
checkpoints to control and track the movements of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other
ethnic minorities.
Israel’s use of facial recognition at checkpoints builds on
other surveillance systems deployed in recent years. Since protests in the East
Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah over the eviction of Palestinian
families in 2021, the presence of cameras has increased, most likely supporting
an Israeli government video surveillance system capable of facial recognition
known as Mabat 2000, according to Amnesty.
In one walk through the area, Amnesty researchers reported
finding one to two cameras every 4.5m. Some were made by Hikvision, the Chinese
surveillance camera maker, and others by TKH Security, a Dutch manufacturer.
TKH Security declined to comment. Hikvision did not respond
to a request for comment.
Government forces also use the cameras on their phones.
Israeli authorities have a facial recognition app, Blue Wolf, to identify
Palestinians, according to Breaking the Silence, an organization that assisted
Amnesty and collects testimonials from Israeli soldiers who have worked in
occupied territories.
Soldiers use the app to photograph Palestinians on the
street or during home raids to register them in a central database and to check
if they are wanted for arrest or questioning, according to the 82-page Amnesty
report and testimonials from Breaking the Silence. Use of Blue Wolf was
reported earlier by The Washington Post.
The surveillance is partly an effort to reduce violence
against Israelis. This year, Palestinian attackers have killed 19 Israelis. At
least 100 Palestinians this year have been killed by Israeli security forces,
many during gunfights that broke out during military operations to arrest
Palestinian gunmen. Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 after
capturing it from Jordan during the Arab-Israeli war that year.
Issa Amro, a Palestinian activist in Hebron, a West Bank
city where there is regular violence, said people are under constant
surveillance. He, his friends, and family are regularly stopped by soldiers to
be photographed using the Blue Wolf app. Surveillance cameras line the streets
and drones commonly fly overhead.
Amro said the Israeli military has become so dependent on
the automated systems that crossing the checkpoints grinds to a halt when there
are technical problems.
“Everything is watched. My whole life is watched. I don’t
have any privacy,” he said. “I feel they are following me everywhere I go.”
Amro said Palestinians are angry that the surveillance tools
never seem to be used to identify crimes by Israeli settlers against
Palestinians.
Ori Givati, a former Israeli tank commander who is now
advocacy director of Breaking the Silence, said the new surveillance systems
began being put in place around 2020. The technology has allowed the Israeli
government to move toward an automated occupation, he said, subjecting
Palestinians to constant oversight and supervision.
The facial recognition systems, he said, are “not just as an
invasion of privacy but a powerful tool for control.”
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