24 January, Arlington: Jerusalem is Palestine Rally! #FreeAhedTamimi

22 January 2018

Wednesday, 24 January
12:00 pm
UTA Libraries
UT Arlington Central Library, 702 Planetarium Place
Arlington, TX, USA
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/1759609564342348/

On December 6th, Donald Trump declared that Jerusalem, a city of great significance to Muslims, Christians, and Jews, as the capital of the occupying power of Israel. Since that declaration, at least 14 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli Military – and thousands of Palestinians being injured and detained, including hundreds of children, for protesting.

Ahed Tamimi, a 16 year old Palestinian, is one of those detained – she was filmed slapping an Israeli soldier after they had invaded her home and shot her 15 year old cousin, Mohammad Tamimi, in the face.

Ahed, her mother, and another cousin were detained without any charges being filed until recently – Ahed has been indicted with 5 charges of “assaulting security forces”, and her mother has been indicted with “assault and incitement” after posting the video of Ahed.

Join Progressive Student Union at the University of Texas at Arlington in condemning Trump’s declaration of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and the political repression of Palestinians, like Ahed, by Israel.

#FreeAhedTamimi #FreePalestine #JerusalemisPalestine

20 January, San Diego: Palestine Contingent at the Women’s March

20 January 2018

Saturday, 20 January
8:00 am – 2:00 pm
At the Women’s March
San Diego, CA
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/325124991335804/

Join the Palestine contingent at the San Diego Women’s March which will take place on January 20th.March to stand with Palestinian women and the support of their basic human rights.

Ahed Tamimi, a prominent 16-year-old young activist, is the latest example of Palestinian women losing their freedom and basic rights. Ahed was taking from her house in An-Nabi Saleh in the middle of the night by Israeli forces. She is now facing charges of assault and for throwing stones.

20 January, Binghamton: Ahed Tamimi – a Profile in Courage

20 January 2018

Saturday, 20 January
12:00 pm
At the Women’s March
From the MLK Jr Memorial Promenade to the United Presbyterian Church
Binghamton, NY

Join a contingent to support Palestinian women at the Women’s March in Binghamton, NY. Demand freedom for Ahed Tamimi and show support for women around the world who stand up for justice, peace and equality.

Copenhagen solidarity evening calls to free Ahed Tamimi, Khalida Jarrar, Ahmad Sa’adat and all Palestinian prisoners

19 January 2018

*Photo: via Irene Clausen – Internationalt Forum/Middle East Group*

On Friday evening, 19 January, activists in Copenhagen gathered to call for the freedom of all Palestinian political prisoners, highlighting the cases of Ahmad Sa’adat, Ahed Tamimi and Khalida Jarrar. The event, organized by the Internationalt Forum Middle East Group, included the screening of several films and videos about Palestinian political prisoners, including 16-year-old teen activist Ahed, Palestinian legislator and feminist Jarrar and PFLP General Secretary and Palestinian national leader Sa’adat.

Charlotte Kates, the international coordinator of Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, participated in the event with a video about the case of Sa’adat as well as an English-subtitled translation of a classic interview with Sa’adat conducted by two French journalists while he was jailed under U.S. and British guard in the Palestinian Authority’s Jericho prison in 2006. The video is below:

Participants at the Solidarity House also wrote letters of solidarity and birthday greetings to Ahed Tamimi, who will reach her 17th birthday on 31 January behind Israeli bars. She will be brought before the military court on that day as well, accused of an array of charges brought against her after she slapped an occupying Israeli soldier on her family’s land in her home village of Nabi Saleh in December. Ahed and her family are leaders in the anti-colonial land defense movement in the village, which has faced land confiscation, attacks and even the theft of their spring from the illegal Israeli settlement of Halamish.

Participants then marched through the streets of the Copenhagen neighborhood of Nørrebro by torchlight, carrying signs highlighting Ahed Tamimi, Khalida Jarrar and Ahmad Sa’adat. They chanted slogans for the freedom of the prisoners and called for the boycott of Israel and a free Palestine. Jarrar was ordered at the beginning of January to another six months of imprisonment without charge or trial under administrative detention; she has been imprisoned since July by Israeli occupation forces.

This week also marks the 16th anniversary of Sa’adat’s detention by the Palestinian Authority security forces in 2001 in a deceptive scheme; he and his comrades would go on to be imprisoned for nearly four years in a PA prison under US and British guard. In 2006, following reports that PA elections could be followed by the release of the prominent political prisoners, Israeli occupation forces violently attacked the Jericho prison with the complicity of the US and British guards; they seized Sa’adat and his comrades, all of whom today are imprisoned in Israeli jails.

Samidoun: Solidarity with Ayşe Düzkan – drop the charges and dismiss the imprisonment order!

19 January 2018

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network stands in solidarity with Ayşe Düzkan, Palestine solidarity organizer, feminist and journalist, writer and editor in Turkey. Ayşe is a strong supporter of Palestinian political prisoners and the Palestinian people’s struggle overall as a founding member of BDS Turkey. As an editor and journalist, she has worked to highlight the cases of the dozens of Palestinian journalists imprisoned by the Israeli occupation for their commitment to showing and telling the truth of the stories of their people. She is one of multiple journalists facing persecution by the Turkish government for their solidarity action with banned newspaper Özgür Gündem.

On Tuesday, 16 January, Ayşe was sentenced to one year and six months in prison after her trial; she is currently free on bond pending appeal. She is not alone but is one of a large number of journalists facing persecution for their solidarity and action for human rights and people’s struggles. Samidoun is reprinting below the statement of BDS Turkey. We express our full solidarity with Ayşe Düzkan and all political prisoners in Turkish jails and demand their immediate release and an end to the persecution and repression of journalists and writers.

**

Ayşe was part of the “Co-Editorship-in-Chief” campaign launched on 3 May 2016 – World Press Freedom Day – in order to stand in solidarity with Özgür Gündem newspaper, ordered closed on 16 August 2016 by a judge’s order that “the newspaper has been constantly making propaganda of the PKK terrorist organization and has acted like a publication organ of this organization.” A statutory decree on 29 October 2016 closed the paper completely.

The “Co-Editorship-in-Chief” campaign enlisted 56 intellectuals, artists, writers, politicians and journalists to serve as honorary co-editors-in-chief of the newspaper between May and August 2016 as the ban on the publication loomed. After the campaign, investigations were opened into 50 participants and charges were filed against 38 of the campaigners, including Ayşe.

Ayşe, along with Huseyin Bektas, Mehmet Ali Celebi and Ragip Duran, was sentenced to one year and six months in prison on charges of “making propaganda for a terrorist organization,” while journalist Huseyin Aykol was sentenced to three years and nine months in prison by Istanbul Heavy Penal Court No.13.

The history of Özgür Gündem is one of repression; founded in 1992, 89 employees of the publication were killed on duty. Its buildings have been bombed and its employees and managers repeatedly imprisoned.

The journalists and activists targeted in this latest repressive campaign are among thousands of Turkish and Kurdish political prisoners and detainees targeted for arrest, charges and imprisonment by the Turkish government over the past two years.

The statement of BDS Turkey follows:

Call for dismissal of imprisonment decision against BDS member Ayşe Düzkan

Ayşe Düzkan, one of the founding members of BDS Turkey – a part of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement – editor of Güldünya Publications and journalist, who has been prosecuted for solidarity activities with Özgür Gündem against its banning, has been sentenced to 1 year and 6 months of imprisonment after her trial on 16th January 2018.

Düzkan was put on trial because she defends freedom of speech and she shows peaceful solidarity with the rights of self-determination of people. The decision ordering her imprisonment reminds us of Israel’s acts which the people of Palestine know very well. Ayşe is a journalist, a friend of the people of Palestine and an active participant in the international solidarity movement with Palestine, and it is unacceptable that she is subjected to the oppressive policies against which she strongly defends Palestinian journalists.

The criminalization of ideas, journalists and articles is a very well-known experience for the people of Palestine, as this tactic is constantly used by the Israeli state. Today, there are 24 Palestinian journalist prisoners in Israeli jails.

On behalf of BDS Turkey, we demand the dismissal of the decision taken against Ayşe Düzkan who has always worked to achieve the Palestinian people’s right to self determination, the freedom of Palestinian journalists and a free Palestine.

16th January 2018

BDS Turkey

21 January, Berlin: International Feminist Block to Free Ahed Tamimi!

19 January 2018

Sunday, 21 January
11:00 am
Brandenburger Tor
Pariser Platz
Berlin
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/147923372654432/

International Feminist Block to Free Ahed Tamimi!

HOW TO FIND OUR BLOCK IN THE DEMO: Details to follow

~ ~ Join us in solidarity with women* and girls* in Palestine and worldwide resisting colonization, military occupation, dictatorships and all forms of injustice! ~ ~

Ahed Tamimi is a 16-year-old Palestinian girl and courageous activist, imprisoned by Israeli authorities for defending her right as a Palestinian to live in peace and in accordance with human rights in her country of birth and belonging. Ahed was filmed slapping an Israeli soldier after they had invaded her home and shot her 15-year-old cousin, Mohammad Tamimi, in the face. Ahed, her mother and another cousin have been detained.

Ahed is now indicted in the Israeli military court with no less than 12 charges (on various accounts of assaulting a soldier, threatening a soldier, disturbing a soldier, incitement, throwing objects) but her true offence is just one: proudly and boldly resisting a colonizer, an occupying military power in her home and in Palestine! Meanwhile, Israeli settlers are quickly released without charges when violently attacking Israeli soldiers. Systematic and repeated violent attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinian people, including brutal abuse of children, go unpunished.

Another detention is the one of Khalida Jarrar who is a Palestinian feminist and member of the Palestinian Legislative Council. Her administrative detention by the Israeli authorities, without charge or trial, has just been extended to one year and can be extended again.

Ahed’s and Khalida’s imprisonments just point to the tip of the iceberg. It is estimated that 300 Palestinian children are currently imprisoned by the Israeli state. More than 6,000 Palestinians are imprisoned by Israel, and as of late November 2017, 425 are held in administrative detention – without charge or trial. According to the United Nations, the Israeli military court which only tries Palestinians – people under military occupation – is in itself a violation of the international human rights law. The conviction rate is nearly 100%, often leading to harsh imprisonment.

THE STRUGGLE IS GLOBAL!

Ahed and Khalida are among the millions of women* and girls* worldwide resisting injustice! The time for solidarity is NOW.

Kurdish Women, such as Gültan Kışanak, feminist activist and member of the HDP in Turkey remain in detention since 2016. Gültan is not the first Kurdish woman in Turkish prisons. Turkey, with the complicity of the German state has been colonising Kurdish lands for a 100 years now. Systematic imprisonment, torture and sexualised violence of Kurdish women is central to their facist rule. According to Amnesty International, it is 17.000 women who remain detained for political reasons. Such “political reasons” are simply the defence of one’s land, community and standing up to the fascist state violence.

Samira Khalil is a Syrian revolutionary activist who, after having spent years in prison for opposing the regime, was reportedly abducted in 2013 in Douma along with award winning human rights lawyer Razan Zaitouneh. The two have been missing ever since with Wael Hamada, Zeitouneh’s husband, and poet Nazem Hammadi. Zeitouneh’s leadership role in the 2011 uprising has been instrumental in grassroots and community organizing between protestors in cities and the suburbs. Since 2011, over 200,000 syrian have been imprisoned and more than 65,000 have disappeared.

Mahinour el-Masry is an Egyptian activist and human rights lawyer, arrested for her organization of and participation in anti-regime protests, as part of the current crack-down of the Al-Sissi regime on its dissidents.

TOUCH ONE TOUCH ALL!

WHY JOIN WOMEN’S MARCH AS A BLOCK?

Because we reclaim feminism for all women*, trans and nonbinary people.
Because feminism can only work intersectional and relational
Feminism that is freedom and liberation for all!
For those in prisons and detention centers.
For those resisting physical and bureacratic state violence and institutional racism at the hands of colonial state and neoliberal authoritarianism
For those defending their bodies, their autonomy, their lands, their communities.

WHO WE ARE
Independent feminist activists from Berlin. This block is not organized by any particular political group, nor does it claim affinity to any. We are joined by the call for solidarity across struggles, geographies, and circumstances. We wish to break the monopoly of interpretation of the people’s will and their resistance(s)from the hands of states, their institutions, and hegemonic forms of political organizing.

Krav Maga seminar with IOF trainers cancelled in Athens due to Palestine solidarity call

17 January 2018

We are republishing the below statement by the Initiative of Solidarity with the Palestinian People in Greece, organizing the demonstration on 20 January for Palestine in Athens:

On Saturday, January 13, a krav maga seminar was scheduled at the Olympic Athletic Center of Athens (OAKA) with the participation of Israeli army trainers. As Initiative of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, we called for a gathering and march to OAKA (https://athens.indymedia.org/event/72683/) to make it clear to the murderers and torturers of the Palestinians that they are undesirable in our country and that they will always find us against them.

A few days after the announcement of our call, the krav maga federation announced the cancellation of the seminar due to the “call from the Initiative of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, in favor of the struggling Palestinian people.”

The cancellation of the seminar is part of a wider plan of actions of solidarity with the Palestinian people. It is a victory of the movement of solidarity with the Palestinian people and it urges us to continue the mobilizations with even greater determination

We call everybody in the march to the American embassy next Saturday, January 20, at 18:00.

LIBERTY FOR PALESTINE
VICTORY TO THE ARMS OF THE PALESTINIAN RESISTANCE

Initiative of Solidarity with the Palestinian People
http://palestineresist.gr/

New York protesters demand freedom for Ahed Tamimi, urge boycott of HP

17 January 2018

Dozens of New Yorkers gathered on Monday, 15 January to demand freedom for Ahed Tamimi and fellow Palestinian child prisoners. The enthusiastic crowd gathered outside the Best Buy electronics store, where they urged shoppers to boycott Hewlett-Packard (HP) products until the corporation stops profiting from Israeli imprisonment, apartheid and colonialism.

The action was organized by Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network. Protesters chanted, carried signs and distributed leaflets about the case of Ahed, the 16-year-old Palestinian teen and youth activist from Nabi Saleh who has been imprisoned by the Israeli occupation since December, and the other 6,200 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. They also distributed information about the global campaign to boycott HP and demand the corporation end its complicity with Israeli colonialism and occupation, including its contracts with the Israel Prison Service.

The protest came on the same day as Ahed’s hearing in military court and followed several large actions in New York City in support of Ahed, her jailed mother Nariman, and their fellow Palestinian prisoners. Ahed’s next hearing before the Israeli military court will take place on 31 January, also her 17th birthday, and there is a global call to action for protests in advance of the hearing; a New York action by many groups is planned for 30 January.

Samidoun organizers and other New York City activists will be participating in a number of events and actions in the coming days. On 18 January, they will join the #DaysofRage protest in Union Square against US war and imperialism organized by the International League of People’s Struggle.

On 20 January, they will join in two actions, including a contingent at the Women’s March for Ahed Tamimi and fellow Palestinian women prisoners on 20 January. Later on the same day, activists will join the Rally against Trump and Capitalism at Grand Central Station.

Abdul-Razeq Farraj among 19 Palestinians jailed without charge or trial; Ayoub al-Asa continues hunger strike

17 January 2018

Palestinian prisoner Ayoub Al-Asa from the village of Obeidiya near Bethlehem is continuing his hunger strike for the eighth consecutive day; he is protesting the extension of his administrative detention, imprisonment without charge or trial. Al-Asa is one of approzimately 500 Palestinians jailed without charge or trial under so-called administrative detention orders, which are indefinitely renewable. Al-Asa, 33, has been imprisoned since 21 June; he is married with three children and previously spent five years in Israeli jails.

Fellow detainee Rizk Rajoub, 61, suspended his own hunger strike on 15 January in an agreement with the prison administration; he will reportedly be either charged in the military courts or released. Rajoub was earlier offered the “choice” of imprisonment without charge or trial or deportation to Sudan; he has spent over 23 years in Israeli prisons, including 10 years in administrative detention without charge or trial.

Al-Asa’s strike proceeds as Israeli military courts issued 19 more administrative detention orders in the past weeks for periods ranging from three to six months; many are renewal orders against Palestinians who have already been jailed under administrative detention. Palestinians can spend years at a time imprisoned without charge under these orders.

Among those ordered imprisoned without charge or trial is Abdul-Razeq Farraj, Palestinian land defender and the administrative and financial director of the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC), a Palestinian agricultural and land defense organization that won the United Nations’ 2014 Equator Prize for its work on food sustainability. The UAWC has been, for over 28 years, in the forefront of supporting Palestinian agricultural workers and connecting with other land defenders around the world. He was re-arrested on 21 May 2017; the renewal of his detention for four months marks the third consecutive order against him. He has been jailed six times and spent over 13 years in Israeli prison, including repeated stints in administrative detention.

The 19 Palestinians ordered imprisoned are:

1. Ghaleb Mohammed Hassan Atatra, Jenin, 5 months, extension
2. Obeida Adnan Barghouthi, Ramallah, 3 months, extension
3. Fadi Ahmed Ghanem, Ramallah, 4 months, extension
4. Falah Taher Nada, El-Bireh, 4 months, extension
5. Adham Mohammed Ajlouni, al-Khalil, 4 months, extension
6. Sami Sobhi al-Haj, Ramallah, 6 months, new order
7. Majd Ahmad Amarneh, Jenin, 4 months, new order
8. Musaab Salah Samhan, Ramallah, 4 months, new order
9. Ibrahim Mohammed Faqih, Ramallah, 4 months, extension
10. Sultan Ibrahim Badawi, Ramallah, 4 months, new order
11. Fadi Mohammed Nasrallah, Bethlehem, 6 months, new order
12. Yousef Khalil Tirturi, Nablus, 4 months, extension
13. Mohammed Abdallah Harb, 4 months, extension
14. Nader Khader Obaidallah, Bethlehem, 6 months, extension
15. Jafer Abdallah Arouj, al-Khalil, 4 months, extension
16. Abdel-Razeq Yassin Farraj, Ramallah, 3 months, extension
17. Mohammed Ibrahim Saleh, Ramallah, 4 months, new order
18. Yousef Mohammed Shuaibi, Ramallah, 6 months, new order
19. Rami Ibrahim Hadosh, al-Khalil, 6 months, new order

The Palestinian Prisoners’ Center for Studies reported that 1086 administrative detention orders were issued by Israeli military courts in 2017. 439 of those were issued as new orders while the remainder were renewal orders against Palestinians already jailed without trial. Seventeen of those orders were issued against children and 3 Palestinian children remain in Israeli prisons under administrative detention (out of a total of 360 Palestinian child prisoners.)

Anas Hamarsheh, 17, losing ability to walk in Israeli prisons

17 January 2018

Palestinian child prisoner Anas Hamarsheh, 17, has reportedly lost the ability to walk; his family have repeatedly warned of the severe dangers to his health in Israeli prison as he suffers from a rare condition that requires treatment.

Asra Voice reported that Anas, 17, from the town of Yabad near Jenin has lost the ability to walk for several days and that his health condition is dangerous. His family has urged his release; he is held in Megiddo prison awaiting a sentence from the military courts.

Leila Hamarsheh, Anas’ sister, said that she had received the troubling news about his health situation and a sudden decline that has made him unable to stand. His family notes that he has not been provided with treatment and that when he was taken to the Ramle prison clinic, his foot was scanned but no treatment was provided. After three days in the Ramle prison clinic he was returned to Megiddo with no prescription or treatment plan.

He suffers from osteonecrosis of the hip and requires treatment; he is in danger of losing his ability to walk. One leg is shorter than the other and he has difficulty running or playing sports; his leg is also at risk of infection.

Anas’ father, Adnan Hamarsheh, uses a wheelchair after he suffered a series of strokes in 2014 while under Israeli interrogation. After two days of hospitalization, he was returned to prison; he was not charged and instead ordered imprisoned for six months under administrative detention. Since his release, he has been denied permission to travel to receive further treatment.

Anas is one of over 350 Palestinian children imprisoned in Israeli jails; each year, approximately 700 children are brought before Israeli military courts. The vast majority of imprisoned Palestinian children have reported physical and psychological abuse under interrogation, denial of access to family members or lawyers and other forms of cruel and inhumane treatment in violation of the Rights of the Child.

There are a number of other seriously ill Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons, including cases like that of Israa Jaabis, seriously wounded and provided with insufficent treatment that daily increase her suffering; there are also cases like that of Mohammed Ahmed Khatib, 47, who is reportedly unable to walk after receiving a botched injection for pain in his side. Hussein Hosni Atallah, 57, from the Balata refugee camp in Nablus, was denied early release despite a severe deterioration in his health. He has metastatic cancer in his lungs, spine, pancreas, liver and head and is held in the Ramle prison clinic.

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