[News] Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Addameer Detained by Israeli Army

[News at freedomarchives.org]

Addameer works to support and free Palestinian political 
prisoners  http://www.addameer.org/

Addameer Press Release - 04 August 2004

Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Addameer Detained by Israeli Army

On Thursday 29 July 2004, the Israeli army arrested Abdul Latif Gheith, 
Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Addameer Prisoners Support and Human 
Rights Association, at Qalandiya military checkpoint.  Mr. Gheith, 63 years 
old, was attempting to cross Qalandiya military checkpoint at approximately 
2 PM when he was arrested by Israeli soldiers positioned at the checkpoint.

Today, Wednesday 04 August 2004 at 2 PM, Addameer's Attorney Adv. Mahmoud 
Hassan was able to visit Abdul Latif Gheith, who has been denied legal 
counsel since his arrest.  In his affidavit to Adv. Hassan, Gheith stated 
that he had been detained at the checkpoint for some time before an Israeli 
General Security Services (Shabak) officer arrived to question him at the 
military checkpoint.  The Shabak officer questioned him for 15 minutes 
about his work at Addameer, the work and activities of Addameer, and 
employees at Addameer.  Shortly after the interrogation, Israeli army 
soldiers transported Gheith to the Israeli settlement of Giva'at Ze'ev near 
Jerusalem, and from there he was then transferred to Benyamin Military 
Detention Camp at the Ofer military base, on the outskirts of the city of 
Ramallah.

 From the moment of his arrest, Gheith was not given any reason for his 
detention and has not been charged with any offence.  Israeli military 
regulations effective in the Occupied Palestinian Territories allow for the 
Israeli army to detain any Palestinian for a period of 8 days without 
providing reason for the detention.  Although Gheith is a resident of 
Jerusalem and holds a Jerusalem ID card, and therefore governed by 
differing regulations of detention, the Israeli occupation authorities have 
dealt with Gheith based on military regulations in effect for holders of 
West Bank ID cards.

At 4 PM today, 04 August 2004, Adv. Mahmoud Hassan was informed that the 
Israeli Military Commander of the West Bank had issued an administrative 
detention order against Gheith.  The order, signed on 04 August 2004, 
states that 썲. Gheith, born in 1941 and a resident of Shu'fat, Jerusalem, 
is to be administratively detained from 05 August 2004 until 04 February 
2005 because he forms a danger to the security of the region.bsp; Gheith 
joins over 700 other Palestinians who are currently arbitrarily detained 
under administrative detention orders, imprisoned without charge or trial, 
some of whom have spent over 3 years in administrative detention.

Abdul Latif Gheith, a prominent public figure in Jerusalem and the 
Palestinian community at large, has devoted his life to the protection of 
human rights and social justice activities.  He has most recently focused 
much of his energy and activism on social justice and human rights issues 
as relate to violations of the rights of Palestinian residents of 
Jerusalem, particularly against the Annexation Wall that has created 
enclaves of Palestinian residential areas and suffocated Palestinian 
society.  Mr. Gheith is a member of the Palestinian Civil Society Committee 
on Jerusalem and a member of the Higher Palestinian National Committee on 
Political Prisoners.

The spectre of administrative detention is not unfamiliar to Gheith who, 
like thousands of other Palestinian activists, has been targeted by this 
form of arbitrary and debilitating punishment.  In 1988, with the beginning 
of the first Intifada, Gheith was arbitrarily detained for 6 months and, 
following a brief release, was detained again in 1989 for another 6 months 
of administrative detention.

Addameer views the administrative detention of Gheith as part of an 
ongoing, systematic oppressive campaign by Israel to use arbitrary 
detention to silence the work of Palestinian social activists, with the aim 
of destroying the social fabric of Palestinian society as a whole.  Like 
the over 700 Palestinians currently in administrative detention, and the 
thousands of others who have been subject to this form of arbitrary 
punishment over the past few decades, Gheith is detained in a military 
detention camp, renown for their inhumane conditions of detention, and is 
subject to the physical and psychological torment of imprisonment for 
indefinite periods of time, without knowing the reasons for his detention 
or the opportunity to defend himself against charges brought against him.

Addameer demands the immediate release of Abdul Latif Gheith, and all 
administrative detainees who continue to be held without charge or trial, 
and for the Israeli Occupation Authorities to immediately cease their 
systematic use of arbitrary detention.

[end]

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_____________________________________________________
ADDAMEER - Prisoners' Support and Human Rights Association
PO Box: 17338, Jerusalem.
Ramallah, West Bank.
Tel: +972-2-2960446 Fax: +972-2-2960447
E-mail: addameer at planet.edu
URL: http://www.addameer.org/



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