Campaign to free Salah Hamouri continues to grow in France

Photo: Demonstration to free Salah Hamouri, Morlaix, 6 October. From Liberte pour Salah Hamouri Facebook

The campaign for the release of imprisoned French-Palestinian lawyer and human rights defender Salah Hamouri has continued to expand. Elsa Lefort, Hamouri’s wife and the spokesperson for his support committee, has continued to speak at events and actions across the country as well as meeting with French diplomatic officials to push for meaningful French action to demand Hamouri’s release. He is currently held without charge or trial under a six-month administrative detention order after he was seized from his home near Jerusalem by Israeli occupation forces, who invaded his house in an armed pre-dawn raid.

Hamouri is a field researcher for Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association and a newly graduated lawyer who passed the Palestinian bar examination only three days before he was seized by Israeli occupation forces on 23 August. He is a Jerusalemite Palestinian and former political prisoner who was jailed for nearly seven years before being released in the Wafa al-Ahrar prisoner exchange and has been an international spokesperson on the issue of Palestinian prisoners.

Portrait of Salah Hamouri by C215 in Ivry-sur-Seine. Photo from Liberte pour Salah Hamouri Facebook

Elsa Lefort, Jean-Claude Lefort and Maitre Berenger Tourne, Hamouri’s French lawyer, met on 9 October with a diplomatic advisor to French president Emmanuel Macron, pushing for meaningful action to free Hamouri from administrative detention, where he is held on secret evidence without charge or trial on an indefinitely renewable term.

“As with every French citizen, Salam Hamouri must be able to benefit from the protection and support that the French State grants to its citizens and residents. Beyond consular protection, the French Republic must also take a position in this case against the arbitrary detention of Salah Hamouri and the harassment to which he and his family are subjected,” said the Support Committee.

Front de Gauche elected officials in Saint-Denis support Hamouri. Photo: Liberte pour Salah Hamouri Facebook

A growing number of elected officials and cities and towns in France have expressed their support for Hamouri. The mayors or municipal councils of Nanterre, Nantes, Fontenay-sous-Bois, Villeneuve Saint-Georges, Stains, Cendras, Ivry-sur-Seine, Besancon, Choisy-le-Roi, Martigues, Montataire, Thil, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Gennevilliers, and a number of others have passed resolutions calling for Hamouri’s release and urging French government action.

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Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network reiterates its urgent demand for the immediate release of Salah Hamouri and all Palestinian prisoners and for the French state to act immediately to defend the rights of their citizen and take action for Salah Hamouri’s freedom. This arduous and endless process of injustice and arbitrary imprisonment without charge or trial is not only an attack on Hamouri, but on all Palestinians who continue to struggle, resist and seek their freedom. This is clearly an attempt on the part of the Israeli state to target an effective, local and international human rights defender working for Palestinian freedom.

The French state must take real action to demand freedom for Salah Hamouri, the Palestinian human rights defender. From the jails and the courts of the occupation to the cities and campuses of the world, he is a consistent and clear voice against oppression and for liberation. Free Salah Hamouri! Libérez Salah Hamouri!

TAKE ACTION

1. SIGN this petition to French president Emanuel Macron and European officials. Demand that they act now to free Hamouri: https://www.change.org/p/emmanuel-macron-demand-the-immediate-release-of-human-rights-defender-salah-hamouri

2. SIGN this French-language petition to the French government to demand they act for Hamouri’s freedom: http://liberezsalahhamouri.wesign.it/fr

3. LIKE AND SHARE the Facebook page for Salah Hamouri, which will be regularly updated with news and actions to demand Salah’s freedom: https://www.facebook.com/freesalahhamouri/

4. ORGANIZE protests and actions to demand Salah’s release and that of his fellow Palestinian prisonersEvents are scheduled in multiple cities – add your own! Email us at samidoun@samidoun.net

5. DEMAND the Israeli occupation release Salah. Take action in the alert from Addameer: http://addameer.org/news/take-action-demand-israeli-officials-immediately-release-salah-hamouri