Surveillance as a Tool of Control: The Panopticon in Occupied Palestine

Israeli state terrorism and settler colonial political practices are tools of control and dispossession in occupied Palestine. Through violence, surveillance, and legal architecture, the Israeli state seeks to control and subordinate Palestinians, simultaneously expanding the settlements on occupied land. This two-pronged approach- airstrikes, ground invasions, suppression of dissent, with structural violence including discriminatory laws and surveillance technologies and dispossession is implemented to undermine Palestinian existence and take territorial and political control. Moreover, these tools create a system of apartheid that segregates Palestinians and Jewish Israelis, eroding the possibility of coexistence and equality in the society. This article argues how surveillance is part of the mechanism of domination by Israel, as it enforces control, which resonates strongly with technological oppression and the “digital panopticon” in Palestine.¹ As per investigations, between 2020 and 2021, it was revealed that Israel has been using surveillance and predictive technologies to control Palestinians.² These technologies not only create a constant state of anxiety but also serve a commercial purpose—occupied Palestine acts as a testing ground for Israel’s spying and surveillance tools, which are later sold to repressive regimes. This has serious implications as more governments use digital tools to monitor political opponents, activists, and journalists^.3 Now, imagine living under constant surveillance, where every move you make is not just tracked but weaponized against you—this is the daily reality for Palestinians. Ironically, Israel has turned surveillance into a tool of apartheid, using it to control and oppress Palestinians while exporting this system globally.

The Israeli occupation of Palestine employs extensive surveillance systems to maintain control over Palestinian territories and populations. These systems include biometric identification technologies like Blue Wolf in Hebron⁴, as well as panoptical practices in Gaza^5. The surveillance apparatus operates on multiple layers, including “exclusionary surveillance” of Palestinians, “normalizing surveillance” of Jewish-Israelis, and “globalizing surveillance” using Zionist constituencies abroad.⁶ These practices are deeply rooted in Israel’s status as a racial state and settler colony, employing a “logic of elimination” against Palestinians, which is inherently racialized in its approach.⁷ Moreover, the surveillance extends beyond occupied territories to target critics of Israel, including Israeli Jews and international supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions campaign.⁸ As per Goodfriend (2023), this comprehensive surveillance system serves to erode Palestinian social life, reorganize occupation violence as economic opportunity, and secure support for Israeli domination over the territory. Additionally, Amnesty International’s 2022 report highlights AI-driven facial recognition systems like “Red Wolf,” used at checkpoints to restrict Palestinians’ movements.⁹ So these technologies have created a modern “panopticon,” where constant observation enforces compliance and suppresses dissent. For example, at Checkpoint 56 in Hebron’s H2 area, Palestinians face intense surveillance with multiple cameras and a ‘Red Wolf’ facial recognition system. This system exclusively targets Palestinians and is part of a broader trend of experimental surveillance in the area. Since 2020, soldiers have used the Blue Wolf app to capture biometric data, turning surveillance into a gamified process that constantly monitors Palestinians¹⁰. This apartheid system in Hebron enforces racial segregation, with Palestinians subjected to discriminatory surveillance, such as the Red Wolf facial recognition system and the Blue Wolf biometric app. At the same time, Israeli settlers are exempt from these measures. In a way, in Hebron the surveillance cameras monitor every Palestinian movement, effectively turning the city into an open-air prison. This control not only limits basic human rights such as access to healthcare, education, and employment but also creates psychological distress and powerlessness as individuals feel continuously watched.

All these actions reflect Israeli state terrorism and settler colonial political practices which are clear violations of human rights and international law and they have unimaginable impact on the Palestinian population. The systematic surveillance, segregation, and oppression of Palestinians meet the definition of apartheid as per the 1973 International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid¹¹. Reports by Amnesty International¹² and Human Rights Watch¹³ affirm that these practices maintain domination by one group over another through institutionalized and legalized racial discrimination. Additionally, the harsh surveillance regime breaches several articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), including the right to privacy (Article 12), freedom of movement (Article 13), and freedom of assembly (Article 20)¹⁴. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Privacy has emphasized that state surveillance must be proportional, necessary, and transparent, a criterion that Israel’s systems blatantly disregard. These measures also undermine international humanitarian law, including the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits collective punishment and the targeting of civilian populations¹⁵. By weaponizing technology, Israel’s surveillance framework reflects the characteristics of state terrorism. The constant fear imposed by facial recognition, drones, and biometric tracking is designed to coerce and intimidate, leaving no space for resistance or collective action. Palestinians live under a system that criminalizes their very existence, suppressing their identity and humanity while eroding their most basic rights. Nada, a resident of East Jerusalem, shares the psychological toll of this repression: “Every time I see a camera, I feel uncomfortable. They always treat you as if you were a target.”¹⁶ This sentiment reflects the broader impact of Israel’s surveillance state, which uses technology not to ensure security but to enforce domination and control.

Interestingly, this system is not merely a domestic control mechanism; it has broader implications extending beyond Palestine. Israel has effectively transformed its surveillance technologies into a lucrative export, marketing them as “battle-tested” tools of control¹⁷. For instance, NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware, originally developed and tested in the occupied territories, has been sold to governments in Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Hungary, and beyond.¹⁸ Similarly, in 2019, Israel doubled its exports of monitoring technology, and in 2022, the European border agency Frontex hired an Israeli company, Elbit Systems, to use drones at Mediterranean crossings despite accusations of human rights violations^19. The export of these technologies normalizes invasive surveillance and uses Palestine as a testing ground. This creates a cycle where the oppression of Palestinians fuels the surveillance industry, which turns into a loop. These practices support the larger settler-colonial agenda, using technology to create fragmentation in the Palestinian communities while ‘marketing repression as innovation’. Moreover, by exporting its surveillance technologies, Israel amplifies its settler-colonial practices internationally, enabling other governments to replicate these systems of oppression. Addressing these injustices requires confronting the intersection of technology, state violence, and colonialism. In an age increasingly shaped by technological control, confronting these practices is not only a matter of justice for Palestinians but highly significant for safeguarding human dignity worldwide.

1 Yara Hawari, “Israel-Palestine Surveillance Technology,” Red Pepper, March 31, 2023, https://www.redpepper.org.uk/global-politics/palestine-middle-east/israel-palestine-surveillance-technology/.

2 Kholoud Faqawi, “The Red Wolf, the Latest Israeli Turn of the Screw in the Control of the Palestinians,” Globalter, accessed December 4, 2024, https://globalter.com/en/The-red-wolf%2C-the-latest-twist-in-Israeli-control-of-the-Palestinians/.

3 Mona Shtaya, “Nowhere to Hide: The Impact of Israel’s Digital Surveillance Regime on the Palestinians,” Middle East Institute, April 27, 2022, https://www.mei.edu/publications/nowhere-hide-impact-israels-digital-surveillance-regime-palestinians.

4 Sophia Goodfriend, “Algorithmic State Violence: Automated Surveillance and Palestinian Dispossession in Hebron’s Old City,” *International Journal of Middle East Studies* 55 (2023): 461–478.

5 Michael Dahan, “The Gaza Strip as Panopticon and Panspectron: The Disciplining and Punishing of a Society,” International Journal of E-Politics 4 (2013): 44–56.

6 Ariel Handel and Hilla Dayan, “Multilayered Surveillance in Israel/Palestine: Dialectics of Inclusive Exclusion,” Surveillance & Society 15 (2017): 471–476.

7 Ronit Lenṭin, “Race and Surveillance in the Settler Colony: The Case of Israeli Rule Over Palestine,” Palgrave Communications 3 (2017), https://ssrn.com/abstract=2997434 or http://dx.doi.org/10.1057/palcomms.2017.56.

8 Ibid

9 Amnesty International, Automated Apartheid: The Role of Automated Surveillance in Israel’s System of Control over Palestinians (2023), https://banthescan.amnesty.org/opt/wp-assets/Automated_Apartheid.pdf.

10 Ibid

11 United Nations, International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (New York: United Nations, 1973), https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.10_International%20Convention%20on%20the%20Suppression%20and%20Punishment%20of%20the%20Crime%20of%20Apartheid.pdf. 

12 Amnesty International, Israel’s Apartheid against Palestinians: A Crime against Humanity (London: Amnesty International, February 2022), https://www.amnesty.org/en/wpcontent/uploads/2022/02/MDE1551412022ENGLISH.pdf

13 Human Rights Watch, A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution (New York: Human Rights Watch, April 2021), https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/media_2021/04/israel_palestine0421_web_0.pdf.

14 United Nations, Universal Declaration of Human Rights (New York: United Nations, 1948), https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights.

15 International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Geneva Convention IV: Article 33 – Prohibition of Punishment by Collective Penalty, 1949, https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/gciv-1949/article-33.

16 Kholoud Faqawi, “The Red Wolf, the Latest Israeli Turn of the Screw in the Control of the Palestinians,” Globalter, accessed December 1, 2024, https://globalter.com/en/The-red-wolf%2C-the-latest-twist-in-Israeli-control-of-the-Palestinians/.

17 Tariq Dana, “Merchants of Death: Israel’s Permanent War Economy,” Security in Context Policy Paper 24-02, January 2024, https://www.securityincontext.org/posts/merchants-of-death-israels-permanent-war-economy.

18 Ibid

19 Yara Hawari, “Israel-Palestine Surveillance Technology,” Red Pepper, March 31, 2023, https://www.redpepper.org.uk/global-politics/palestine-middle-east/israel-palestine-surveillance-technolog