10 Apr 2012 | Middle East and North Africa
Two arrests linked to Facebook posts critical of the Palestinian Authority (PA) have spurred a variety of human rights and media freedom groups to call on the PA to stop harassing their critics.
On Wednesday 28 March, Palestinian Preventative Security Forces detained lecturer Ismat Abdul-Khaleq “after they read a quote on her Facebook page accusing President Mahmoud Abbas of being a traitor and demanding he resigns,” lawyer Issam Abdeen of the Palestinian rights group al-Haq told the Associated Press.
Defaming a public official is illegal in the West Bank. As happened in the recent case of detained journalist Yousef Al Shayeb, Abdul-Khaleq was told that she will be held for two weeks while the Public Prosecutor’s office “searches for evidence”. According to the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz, she is being held in solitary confinement.
On Sunday 1 April, journalist Tariq Khamis was arrested after discussing Abdul-Khaleq’s arrest on Facebook. Khamis told the website Electronic Intifada that he believed his arrest was connected to an article he wrote about youth groups that were critical of the authorities. He told Reuters that during his three-hour interrogation, “I was questioned on my work as a journalist, and they confiscated the files on my laptop.” He added “the authorities are afraid of journalism.”
Human Rights Watch, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Al-Haq and Reporteurs Sans Frontieres have all expressed their concern at the way critical voices are being targeted and detained by the PA.
The authorities emphasise that the judiciary and the government are two separate entities, but criticism of the authorities can result in incursions by security and judicial sources. Adnan Dmeiri, the spokesman of the security services which detained and questioned both Abdul-Khaleq and Khamis, claims “freedom of expression stops at defamation”. Yet his following statement, that “any citizen can respond to insults and baseless accusations with a lawsuit” does not hold true. Due process has not been followed and citizens are detained by the state while government bodies search for evidence against them. Even if Abdul-Khaleq, Khamis or even Yousef Al Shayeb are never formally charged, a message has been sent to PA’s critics in order to intimidate them. Its actions undermine its efforts to present themselves as a democratic body in a bid for further recognition and foreign investment.
Ruth Michaelson is a freelance journalist based in Ramallah. Follow her on Twitter @_Ms_R
5 Apr 2012 | Uncategorized
On 28 March a primary court in the coastal city of Mahdia, sentenced two atheist friends, Jabeur Mejri and Ghazi Beji, to seven and a half years in prison, and to a fine of 1200 Tunisian Dinars (around USD $800) each, over the use of social networks to publish content deemed blasphemous. Mejri,and Beji were put on trial following a complaint lodged by a group of residents in Mahdia.
Private radio station Shems FM reported that Mejri and Beji published cartoons insulting the Prophet.
While Jabeur Mejri is in prison, his friend Ghazi Beji, who was sentenced in absentia, is at large. He fled to Athens to avoid prosecution. According to atheistica.com Beji wrote a book called “the Illusion of Islam”, and published it on the internet. His friend Mejri, wrote another book and “cursed the government, Islamists, Prophet Mohamed, drew a pig sleeping on the Kaaba [a sacred building for Muslims], and expressed his hatred towards Arabs and his love to Israel and its prime minister Natanyaho [sic]”.
Mejri, and Beji were convicted of “insulting others via public communication networks”, and spreading publications and writings that could “disturb public order” and “ moral transgression”.
The League of Tunisian Humanists condemned the sentence and complained about the “unclear circumstances that surrounded the trial, since one of the defendants fled”.
Olfa Riahi, a blogger and a journalist, who broke the story on the Tunisian blogosphere, told Index on Censorship that she is looking forward to see more associations getting together to support Mejri and Beji. “Many associations have started to react, but I would like to see [human rights group group] Liberty and Equity, as an association with an Islamic background, reacting too”, she said.
Bochra Bel Haji Hmida, a renowned Tunisian lawyer and women rights activist, will defend Mejri and Beji in their appeal.
Though the 2011 uprising has permitted Tunisians to freely express themselves, and criticize the political system; Islam has turned out to be a red line for the predominantly Muslim country, where censorship is taking on a religious tone.
17 Feb 2012 | Middle East and North Africa
On 16 February a court postponed the trial of Samir Feriani to 1 March. Ferani is charged with “distributing false information”, and “accusing a public employee of violating law without proof”.
Feriani, a former senior official at the Interior Ministry, became known to the public in May 2011 when he published in two local newspapers, L’Audace, and L’expert, a letter in which he accused high ranking officials at the Ministry of being responsible for the killing of protesters during the 2011 uprising. Before publishing the letter, Feriani addressed it to the Interior Minister at that time Habib Essid, who seems to have ignored it.
In his letter Feriani also claimed that classified documents showing collaboration between ousted Tunisian President Ben Ali and the Israeli secret service Mossad were intentionally destroyed by officials in the ministry.
After the allegations were made, Feriani was arrested and taken into military detention on 19 May 2011. He described his arrest as a “murder attempt”. “A car sought to crash over me”, he said.
On 22 September, a military court in Tunis provisionally set him free, acquitted him of the charge of “harming the external security of the state”, and deferred his case to a civil court.
“I do trust the judiciary…just like the military justice proved my innocence, the civil justice will do the same”, Feriani toldIndex a few days before the 16 February hearing.
He also denied that he is on a hunger strike, saying: “I would like to assure the public opinion, that I feel high in my spirits.”
Feriani is still plagued by the allegations made against him. On 1 February he was sacked from his job at the Interior Ministry. “The decision to sack me was abusive…there is a smear campaign organised against me by the old secret police”.
Feriani is often described as Tunisia’s first prisoner of conscience in the post Ben Ali era.
10 Feb 2012 | News, Uncategorized
Two journalists were arrested by Palestinian Authority officials on 31 January after making comments against Mahmoud Abbas and the PLO.
Rami Samara, an editor with local news agency Wafa and radio station Ajyal, told news agency AFP that he was detained by plainclothes security agents at the Muqata, Abbas’ headquarters, following a comment that he had posted on Facebook. Underneath an article which blamed Israel rather than the PA itself for the failure of the Palestinian Executive Committee to meet in Amman last month, he wrote: “seriously, members of the central committee of the sole representative of the Palestinian people, was this decision worth the meeting in the Muqata [compound] and the heating and the electricity and the tea and coffee.”
Samara told AFP that he was held for four hours and shown “about 100 pages of comments I made on Facebook, mostly criticising the Palestinian Authority and the PLO.” Questioned by agents from both Military and General Intelligence agencies, he reported that they told him he would be released on agreeing to sign a confession that he had been the organiser of an anti-government demonstration of a group within the PLO that is critical of Abbas. Despite refusing, Samara was eventually released later that day.
In a second case, Yousef Shayeb, a journalist with the Jordanian newspaper al-Ghad was reported being detained by Palestinian intelligence officials for eight hours. Officials questioned him regarding a series of stories that he had written about corruption within the Palestinian diplomatic mission to France. According to Shayeb, those interrogating him demanded that he reveal his sources, which he refused to do. Government spokesman Ghassan Khatib told AFP that Shayeb was questioned in connection with potential libel charges, in order that security services could decide whether to file charges against him.
Both journalists are members of the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate, a majority Fatah organisation, meaning that the political crossover between the organisation and the Palestinian Authority itself resulted in limited action being taken against the arrests by the head of the PJS, Dr Abdel Nasser Najjar.
Although a press release by the PJS stated that it would “spare no effort to defend journalists,” with Dr Najjar quoted as saying that it is “the responsibility of the Association to follow up the issues of journalists,” it is unclear what if any steps were taken by the PJS to protect the reporters concerned. Compared to the outcry in October 2010 when Hamas occupied the offices of the PJS in Hamas-controlled Gaza, it would seem that there is little political gain to be had in reacting to the arrests in a manner that was more than cosmetic. Attempts to contact Wafa and the PJS directly to discuss the cases were also ignored.
Despite local media outlets having an obvious vested interest in press freedom, coverage of the arrests was extremely limited. Wafa, the agency where Samara works, published a very short report which was also republished by the Palestinian News Network, citing its source very clearly. Bigger news agencies such as Ma’an, who have reported extensively in the past week of journalists’ detained by Israeli forces in Nablus and Bethlehem, were silent about Samara and Shayeb.
In Reporters Without Borders’ annual Press Freedom Index published last month, the Palestinian Territories ranked 153rd out of 179 countries, dropping three places lower than last year. Although the drop was due to the Hamas takeover of the PJS Gaza office, both parts of the Territories examined as one received a lower placement than Afghanistan or Iraq.
Ruth Michaelson is a freelance journalist based in Ramallah. Follow her on Twitter @_Ms_R
