Palestinian girl’s trial continued once more; mother arrested while visiting her son

The trial of imprisoned Palestinian girl, Manar Shweiki, 15, was continued until 2 February for the tenth consecutive time.

Manar, from Jerusalem, is accused of possessing a knife in order to carry out a resistance action; however, the knife was allegedly found inside her bag after she was arrested by occupation forces after leaving her school in the Wadi Hilweh neighbourhood of Silwan on 6 December 2015.

She was taken to a military base. Her father, Majdi Shweiki, told Asra Media that the arrest was an action of revenge by occupation forces; Manar was detained and released twice, and threatened by interrogators that she would be arrested again. Shweiki also said that an intelligence officer told Manar’s mother that she will “not get away this time” with avoiding prison. Further, Shweiki said, her parents were not informed originally of her detention and she was not allowed a lawyer. He has been denied the right to visit her as a former prisoner.

On Tuesday, 3 January, imprisoned girl Malak Salman, 16, from Beit Safafa south of Jerusalem, will be brought before a hearing; she was arrested on 9 February 2016 and is accused of attempting to attack Israeli occupation soldiers near the Damascus gate in Jerusalem.

Meanwhile, on Sunday, 1 January, Rayida Alayan, the mother of imprisoned Palestinian Jerusalemite prisoner Mohammed Alayan, was seized by occupation forces as she traveled to visit her son in Gilboa prison. She was removed from the visitors’ waiting room and taken to an unknown destination. The Alayans are from the village of Issawiya east of Jerusalem. Mohammed Alayan has been imprisoned since 7 June 2015, and he is serving a 44-month sentence in Israeli prison, accused of throwing Molotov cocktails at settlers’ cars and of membership in a prohibited organization, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

There are currently 53 Palestinian women held in Israeli jails, including 11 minor girls, among them Manar and Malak.