Abdallah Abu Rhamah at court yesterday. Picture credit: Oren Ziv/Active Stills*
The sentencing phase in the trial of Abdallah Abu Rahmah, the coordinator of the Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, began yesterday at the Ofer Military Court. Abu Rahmah was convicted of organizing illegal marches and of incitement last month, but cleared of the violence charges he was indicted for – stone-throwing and a vindictive arms-possession charge for collecting used tear-gas projectiles and displaying them.
The prosecution demanded Abu Rahmah will be sent to prison for a period exceeding two years, saying that as an organizer, a harsh sentence is required to serve as a deterrence not only for Abu Rahmah himself, but to others who may follow in his footsteps as well. This statement by the prosecution affirms the political motivation behind the indictment, and the concern raised by EU foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, that “the possible imprisonment of Mr Abu Rahma is intended to prevent him and other Palestinians from exercising their legitimate right to protest against the existence of the separation barriers in a non violent manner.”
Another argument made by the prosecution in their demand of a harsh sentence, were the repercussions and expenses caused to the army by anti-Wall demonstrations. These which were presented in detail in a report by what the prosecution called an “expert witness”, who, in fact, is the Army’s Binyamin Brigade’s operations officer, Major Igor Mussayev.
The document includes many factual errors, such as mentioning seven Palestinian fatalities in Bil’in and Ni’ilin demonstrations, while in fact there were only six. In a ridiculous attempt to show that the military has no superiority over demonstrators, the “expert opinion” also claims that the effective range of rubber-coated bullets or 0.22″-caliber live ammunition is significantly lower than that of a slingshot. The report, in fact, claims that the effective range of a rubber-coated bullet is 50 meters – the minimal range of use according to army open fire regulations.
During the hearing, Major Mussayev claimed that all the weapons mentioned in the document are non-lethal crowd control measures. When asked specifically about the 0.22″ caliber bullets, which were explicitly classified as live ammunition by the military’s Judge Advocate General and banned for crowd control use, he replied that they too are crowd control measures. Such a reply from the officer in charge of operations in the brigade that deals with most West Bank demonstrations points to the army’s policy of negligent use of arms in the attempt to quash the Palestinian popular struggle.
The highly biased document presented to the court also detailed the expenses on ammunition shot at demonstrators (almost 6.5 million NIS between August 2008 to December 2009). It also mentioned the costs of erecting a concrete wall in Ni’ilin in order to prevent damage to the barrier (8.5 million NIS), but failed to mention the costs of rerouting the Wall in Bil’in due to the original path’s illegality, or the fact that even now, three years after the Supreme Court decision to reroute the Wall, it is still standing on its original path.
The hearing, which lasted more than three hours, saw a court-room packed with diplomats, representatives of international and Israeli human rights organizations, as well as friends and family members.
The Spanish Parliament followed the footsteps of the EU and the Desmond Tutu of the Elders, and joined the rising tide of international criticism over Abu Rahmah’s conviction of incitement by an Israeli military court.
The Spanish Parliament’s Intergroup for Palestine issued a statement that expressed their “deep concern that Abdallah Abu Rahmah’s potential incarceration aims at preventing him and other Palestinians from exercising their legitimate right to protest against the existence of the Wall in a non violent manner.” (full text of the statement is available below or here in the Spnish original)
Photo: Oren Ziv / Active Stills
The Intergroup for Palestine is an official body of the Spanish Parliament, in which all political parties represented. Its decisions and statements are achieved in full consensus
Abu Rahmah’s trial will resume next Wednesday, the 15th of September, as it will enter the sentencing phase. The prosecution will argue its case for an acrid sentencing, and are expected to ask for a sentence exceeding two years. The defense will argue Abu Rahmah had already been devoid of his freedom for too long, and should be released immediately.
Background Abu Rahmah, the coordinator of the Bil’in Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, was acquitted of two out of the four charges brought against him in the indictment – stone-throwing and a ridiculous and vindictive arms possession charge. According to the indictment, Abu Rahmah collected used tear-gas projectiles and bullet cases shot at demonstrators, with the intention of exhibiting them to show the violence used against demonstrators. This absurd charge is a clear example of how eager the military prosecution is to use legal procedures as a tool to silence and smear unarmed dissent.
The court did, however, find Abu Rahmah guilty of two of the most draconian anti-free speech articles in military legislation: incitement, and organizing and participating in illegal demonstrations. It did so based only on testimonies of minors who were arrested in the middle of the night and denied their right to legal counsel, and despite acknowledging significant ills in their questioning.
The court was also undeterred by the fact that the prosecution failed to provide any concrete evidence implicating Abu Rahmah in any way, despite the fact that all demonstrations in Bil’in are systematically filmed by the army.
Under military law, incitement is defined as “The attempt, verbally or otherwise, to influence public opinion in the Area in a way that may disturb the public peace or public order” (section 7(a) of the Order Concerning Prohibition of Activities of Incitement and Hostile Propaganda (no.101), 1967), and carries a 10 years maximal sentence.
STATEMENT FROM THE PARLIAMENTARY INTERGROUP FOR PALESTINE ABOUT ABDALLAH ABU RAHMAH’S CONVICTION
On August 24, 2010, the coordinator of the Bil’in Popular Committee (West Bank), Abdallah Abu Rahmah, was convicted of incitement and of participating in and organizing demonstrations by an Israeli Military Court.
This sentence comes after an eight months trial, during which the defendant has been bereft of freedom.
He is now awaiting his sentence, which could carry several years n prison.
The Parliamentary Intergroup for Palestine considers the Bil’in peaceful struggle against the construction of the Separation Wall, which was declared illegal, as a defense of the primacy of law and international law in the face of arbitrary decisions, which ignore not only the reiterated resolutions of the United Nations’ political bodies, but also Israel’s own legal organization.
The peaceful opposition to the occupation and the construction of the Wall is in and of itself a defense of the individual and collective human rights of the Palestinian People, which deserves the protection of the international community.
It is on these grounds that Catherine Ashton, the High Representative of the European Union, has issued a statement on the issue on August 24, to which the Intergroup subscribes.
Therefore, we express our deep concern that Abdallah Abu Rahmah’s potential incarceration aims at preventing him and other Palestinians from exercising their legitimate right to protest against the existence of the Wall in a non violent manner.
Spanish Congress of Deputies Hall, August 30, 2010.
Abdallah Abu Rahmah protects a young girl in Bilin
27 August 2010
The West Bank village of Bil’in has become a symbol of the wider popular resistance movement in Palestine. Abdallah Abu Rahmah, head of Bi’in’s Popular Committee, is one of many key organizers of peaceful resistance that Israel has used legal means to persecute. He was convicted on Tuesday of two out of four charges in an Israeli military court and faces up to ten years in jail. The facts of his case – and what you can do to help put pressure on Israel – are set out below.
Name: Abdallah Abu Rahma Age: 39 years old Incarcerated: Ofer military prison Job: Abdallah worked as a high school teacher at the Latin Patriarchate school in Birzeit near Ramallah until he was jailed. He also owned a chicken farm.
Family: Abdallah is married to Majida and they have three children — seven year-old Luma, five year-old Lian and eight month-old baby Laith.
Why is he imprisoned?
As coordinator of Bili’in’s Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, Abdallah is seen as a threat by Israel because of his prominent role in the nonviolent struggle which has attracted international support. He is being legally persecuted because of the successes of the grassroots nonviolent resistance movement which has been growing steadily for the last 5 years.
EU representatives attended all court hearings over the last 8 months and they did not fail to notice the politically motivated nature of the prosecution. Catherine Ashton, European Union High Representative, said yesterday that the EU views Abdallah as “a human rights defender committed to non-violent protest” and that the EU was “deeply concerned that the possible imprisonment of Mr Abu Rahmah is intended to prevent him and other Palestinians from exercising their legitimate right to protest”.
How and when was he arrested?
At 2am on Thursday 10th December 2009 (International Human Rights Day and exactly one year after receiving the Carl Von Ossietzky Medal from the International League for Human Rights) Abdallah was arrested by Israeli forces.
Several military jeeps surrounded his home the West Bank city of Ramallah. Israeli soldiers broke the door down, extracted Abdallah from his bed, blindfolded him and took him away.
Abdallah Abu Rahmah arrested by the Israeli military
What crime does Israel say he has committed?
Abdallah faced 4 charges. He was kept in prison for 8 months during the trial. On August 24th he was found not guilty of stone-throwing and possession of arms (the latter absurd charge brought by the military prosecution, was based on a collection of spent munitions fired at peaceful protesters by the Israeli army, and displaying by Abdallah to demonstrate the disproportionate violence used to disperse demonstrations in Bil’in.).
But he was convicted of organizing “illegal” demonstrations and of “incitement”.
Abdallah was convicted based only on the forced testimonies of minors who were arrested from their beds at the middle of the night and denied their right to legal counsel – not a single piece of material evidence was presented during the entire trial, despite the fact that the military film every demonstration.
The trial
Under military law, incitement is defined as “The attempt, verbally or otherwise, to influence public opinion in the Area in a way that may disturb the public peace or public order” (section 7(a) of the Order Concerning Prohibition of Activities of Incitement and Hostile Propaganda (no.101), 1967), and carries a 10 years maximal sentence.
Abu Rahmah’s case was the first time the prosecution had used the organizing and participating in illegal demonstrations since the first Intifada. Military law defines illegal assembly in a much stricter way than Israeli law does, and in practice forbids any assembly of more than 10 people without receiving a permit from the military commander.
Diplomats from France, Malta, Germany, Spain and the UK, as well as a representative of the European Union were in attendance to observe the trial. The EU have criticized the conviction. The complete verdict of the Israeli military court can be read online. Click here to read it in Hebrew. It is currently being translated into English and will be available online soon.
Abdallah is likely to be sentenced in the next few weeks – he faces up to ten years in jail. The prosecution is expected to call for a jail term exceeding two years.
Abdallah’s outrageous conviction will be followed by a sentence in the coming weeks. The amount of pressure we will be able to generate in this time could influence Abdallah’s sentence, but will also make clear to Israeli authorities that the repression of the popular struggle does have a political price.
Please use the below template letters prepared by the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee to ask your Minister of Foreign Affairs to send an official inquiry to the Israeli government about Abdallah. Demand that your country apply pressure on Israeli officials to release Abdallah Abu Rahmah and stop targeting popular struggle.
Abdallah’s history of organizing
Abdallah has been a member of the Bil’in Popular Committee since its conception in 2004. As coordinator, Abu Rahmah not only regularly organized and attended the weekly Friday demonstrations but also did the media work for the Bil’in struggle.
Abdallah Abu Rahmah (right) with Ela Bhatt, Jimmy Carter, Desmond Tutu, Fernando H Cardoso, Mary Robinson and Gro Brundtland of the Elders during a visit to Bil'in in August 2009
Abdallah represented the village in engagements around the world to further Bil’in’s cause. He traveled to Montreal in June 2009 to participate in a speaking tour and for the village’s legal case against two Canadian companies building settlements on Bil’in’s land. In December 2008, he participated in a speaking tour in France and traveled to Germany to accept the the Carl von Ossietzky Medal for outstanding service in the realization of basic and human rights, awarded by the board of trustees of the International League for Human Rights on behalf of Bil’in.
In August 2009 he met with internationally renowned human rights defenders like Nobel Peace prize winner Desmond Tutu and former US President Jimmy Carter, as part of a visit by The Elders to Bil’in village.
Treatment in prison
A previous raid targeting Abu Rahmah, on 15th September 2009, was executed with such exceptional violence that a soldier was subsequently indicted for assault.
Abdallah has written that the Ofer prison consists of a collection of tents enclosed by razor wire and an electrical fence, with 22 prisoners in each tent. In winter, he says, wind and rain comes in through cracks in the tent and prisoners are not provided with sufficient blankets, clothes, or other basic necessities. They are also not given enough food, he states.
Abdallah was arrested in his slippers in the middle of the night on 10th December 2009, and wrote on 17th February 2010 that he had still not been provided with proper shoes, nor were his family given permission to supply him with shoes. After repeated requests, he writes, his watch was returned.
The Israeli authorities allow family visits extremely infrequently. The families of prisoners are viewed as security threats. For more on the treatment of prisoners see Adameer, Prisoners’ Support and Human Rights Association.
Abdallah Abu Rahmah
Abdallah’s words:
The afternoon before his arrest on 10th December 2009, Abdallah prepared a speech to be delivered on his behalf at the World Association for Human Rights awards ceremony in Berlin. In his speech, Abdallah wrote:
“Unlike Israel, we have no nuclear weapons, and no army, but we do not want or need those things, because of the justice of our cause, we have your support and with it we know that ultimately we will bring down Israel’s Apartheid Wall.”
“The price I and many others pay in freedom does not deter us. I wish that my two young daughters and baby son would not have to pay this price together with me. But for my son and daughters, for their future, we must continue our struggle for freedom…”
Also, read “A Letter from My Holding Cell”, written by Abdallah from Ofer Military Detention Camp and detailing the conditions in prison and stating:
“From the confines of my imprisonment it becomes so clear that our struggle is far bigger than justice for only Bil’in or even Palestine. We are engaged in an international fight against oppression. I know this to be true when I remember all of you from around the world who have joined the movement to stop the wall and settlements. Ordinary people enraged by the occupation have made our struggle their own, and joined us in solidarity. We will surely join together to struggle for justice in other places when Palestine is finally free.”
Bil’in’s struggle
Perhaps the greatest irony of Abdallah’s case is that he has been found guilty of organizing supposedly “illegal” protests against Israel’s separation wall which itself has been declared illegal by the International Court of Justice and even by Israel’s own High Court in the case of the route it takes through the village of Bil’in.
The West Bank village of Bil’in is located 12 kilometers west of Ramallah and 4 km east of the Green Line. It is an agricultural village, around 4,000 dunams (988 acres) in size, and populated by approximately 1,800 residents.
Starting in the early 1980’s, and more significantly in 1991, approximately 56% of Bil’in’s agricultural land was declared ‘State Land’ for the construction of the settlement bloc, Modi’in Illit.
In 2004, the International Court of Justice ruled that the Wall in its entirety is illegal under international law, particularly under International Humanitarian Law. The Court went on to rule that Israel’s settlements are illegal under the same laws, noting that the Wall’s route is intimately connected to the settlements adjacent to the Green Line, further annexing 16% of the West Bank to Israel.
Despite the advisory opinion, early in 2005, Israel began constructing the separation Wall on Bil’in’s land, cutting the village in half in order to place Modi’in Illit and its future growth on the “Israeli side” of the Wall.
Bilin organizes regular demonstrations against the occupation. Photo: HAMDI / RANI BRONATIn March 2005, Bil’in residents began to organize almost daily direct actions and demonstrations against the theft of their lands. Gaining the attention of the international community with their creativity and perseverance, Bil’in has become a symbol for popular resistance. Almost five years later, Bil’in continues to have weekly Friday protests.
Bil’in has held annual conferences on popular resistance since 2006, providing a forum for activists, intellectuals, and leaders to discuss strategies for the non-violent struggle against the Occupation.
Israeli forces have used sound and shock grenades, water cannons, rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas grenades, tear gas canisters and 0.22 caliber live ammunition against protesters.
On 17 April 2009, Bassem Abu Rahma was shot with a high-velocity tear gas projectile in the chest by Israeli forces and subsequently died from his wounds at a Ramallah hospital.
Out of the 75 residents who have been arrested in connection to demonstrations against the Wall, 27 were arrested since the beginning of a night raid campaign on 23 June 2009. Israeli armed forces have been regularly invading homes and forcefully searching for demonstration participants, targeting the leaders of the Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements.
Persecuted for his key role in organizing the successful grassroots campaign against the wall and Jewish-only settlement on Bil’in’s land, Abdallah was convicted based only on the forced testimonies of minors who were arrested from their beds at the middle of the night. not a single material evidence was presented during the entire trial.
Last year, on the night of International Human Right Day, Thursday December 10th, at 2am, Abdallah Abu Rahmah was arrested from his home in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Seven military jeeps surrounded his house, and Israeli soldiers broke the door, took Abdallah from his bed and, after briefly allowing him to say goodbye to his wife Majida and their three children — seven year-old Luma, five year-old Lian and eight month-old baby Laith — they blindfolded him and took him into custody.
Abu Rahmah did not find himself behind bars because he is a dangerous man. Abdallah, who is amongst the leaders of the Palestinian village of Bil’in, is viewed as a threat for his work in the five-year unarmed struggle to save the village’s land from Israel’s wall and expanding settlements.
As a member of the Popular Committee and its coordinator since it was formed in 2004, Abdallah has represented the village of Bil’in around the world. In June 2009, he attended the village’s precedent-setting legal case in Montreal against two Canadian companies illegally building settlements on Bil’in’s land; in December of 2008, he participated in a speaking tour in France, and on 10 December 2008, exactly a year before his arrest, Abdallah received the Carl Von Ossietzky Medal for Outstanding Service in the Realization of Basic Human Rights, awarded by the International League for Human Rights in Berlin.
Last summer Abdallah was standing shoulder to shoulder with Nobel Peace laureates and internationally renowned human rights activists, discussing Bil’in’s grassroots campaign for justice when The Elders visited his village. This summer, he may be sent to years in prison, exactly for his involvement in this campaign.
Abdallah’s outrageous conviction today will be followed by a sentence in the coming weeks. The amount of pressure we will be able to generate in this time could influence Abdallah’s sentence, but will also make clear to Israeli authorities that the repression of the popular struggle does have a political price.
Please use the below template letters prepared by the Popular Struggle Coordination Committee to ask your Minister of Foreign Affairs to send an official inquiry to the Israeli government about Abdallah. Demand that your country apply pressure on Israeli officials to release Abdallah Abu Rahmah and stop targeting popular struggle.
Tom Hurndall shortly before he was shot and killed.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Correction appended
The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) condemns the early release from prison of the Israeli soldier that murdered photography student and ISM volunteer Tom Hurndall in Gaza in 2003. The Israeli press yesterday reported that Taysir Hayb will be released three years early from an already short eight-year sentence.
His murder was only a symptom of a much wider culture of impunity in the Israeli army. This early release serves to reinforce the notion that the Israeli army can continue to commit war crimes against Palestinians without fear of serious consequences.
Tom’s mother Jocelyn Hurndall told ISM London that: “this reduced sentence comes at a time when the world is becoming more sceptical about Israel’s investigations into its own actions. It’s a reminder of Israel’s disregard for international law and opinion.”
When Hayb was sentenced in 2005, human rights activist, Raphael Cohen, who was with Tom on the day of the shooting said, “On the very street where Tom was shot, two children had been shot just days before. This is why he and the rest of the group went to that spot, to protest against the shooting of children as they played outside their homes. There has never been any investigation into the shootings of those children.”
To this day, there has still been no investigation of these deaths or of the thousands of other Palestinian civilians killed by Israeli soldiers. Only last month in Jerusalem Ziad Joulani, 41, a Palestinian shopkeeper and father of three with no criminal record or history of political activism, was killed when Israeli police opened fire as he got out of his car. [1] His killing is not being investigated.
Tom’s family had to fight hard to achieve even the eight-year manslaughter conviction that they won in 2005, against a system of Israeli obfuscation and lies, and an indifferent British government. In a statement yesterday the Foreign Office merely said: “We note the court’s decision to release Taysir Hayb and recognise the grief this decision will cause to the Hurndall family,” describing the deliberate act of murder as “a tragedy”.
Tom’s father Anthony hit back in the Guardian today, condemning this as a “weak response” by the British government, and demanding to meet with ministers. He said: “I would like them to say that this is not just a tragedy but that the Israeli government is directly responsibile for Tom’s death and should acknowledge this and take steps to put matters right by changing policies to ensure that civilians are not shot or killed indiscriminately.”
Israel did not even bother to inform the Hurndall family in advance of the news reaching the Israeli press, and Tom’s sister Sophie only learnt the news when ISM London contacted her yesterday.
Hayb shot Tom in the forehead with a high velocity bullet using a rifle with a telescopic sight, while he attempted to rescue Palestinian children in Gaza from Israeli gunfire. According to an Observer report from the 2005 trial, Hayb was “an award-winning marksman”. [2] Tom never regained consciousness, dying nine months later in a London hospital at the age of 22.
Jewish nurse and peace activist Alice Coy, who saw Tom shot, said Hayb was only part of “a culture of impunity in which generations of Israelis are taught that Arabs hate them and are subhuman. They are then given guns and they know they can get away with killing Palestinians. The occupation and aggression of Zionist policy is harming ordinary Israelis as well as Palestinians.”
Amnesty International says that: “The shocking truth is that Israeli soldiers kill civilians in Gaza with near-total impunity, week in week out” [3]
B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights organisation, report that “From the beginning of the [second] intifada, on 29 September 2000, to the end of 2008 (not including Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, which began on 27 December), [Israeli] security forces killed more than 2,200 Palestinians who were not taking part in the hostilities at the time they were killed. However, a Military Police investigation was opened in only 287 cases of suspected illegal shooting by security forces. This number includes investigations into cases in which civilians were wounded. Only 33 of these investigations resulted in the filing of indictments” [4]
Israeli human rights group Yesh Din clarifies that of these, Haib is the only soldier to have been convicted for an offence causing death: “From the beginning of the second intifada until the end of 2009, Courts-Martial convicted soldiers of offenses connected with the deaths of only four civilians: three Palestinians and one British national. One soldier was convicted of manslaughter, and he was the only one convicted of an offense of causing death. Four other soldiers were convicted of offenses of negligence.” [5]
For more information:
Alice Coy, UK: +44 7828 540512
ISM Media Office, Ramallah: +972 59 760 6276 or +972 2 241 0604
ISM London: +44 7913 067 189
REVISION, 21st July: The initial version of this press release erroneously stated that Ziad Joulani had been shot “last week”. In fact he was killed on the 14th of June, as stated in the text of our reference. This online version has been revised to read “last month”. The final paragraph with the Yesh Din figures on convictions was also added.
