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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://www.addameer.org/prisoner/4527">addameer.org</a>
<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Ruba Assi</h1>
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<div class="gmail-reader-estimated-time">October 14, 2021<br></div>
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<div class="gmail-moz-reader-content gmail-reader-show-element"><div id="gmail-readability-page-1" class="gmail-page"><div><p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Name: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ruba Fahmy Muhammad Dar Assi</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Date of Birth: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>1 March 2000</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Residence: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ramallah - Beitunya</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Marital Status: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Single</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Occupation: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Third-year Sociology student at Birzeit University</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Date of Arrest: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>9 July 2020</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Prison: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Damon</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Legal Status: </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>Serving a 21-month sentence</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Arrest and Interrogation</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>On 9 July 2020, Israeli
Occupation Forces (IOF) stormed Ruba’s house in Beituniya at 2 in the
morning, wherein they began shouting at her father and demanding Ruba.
IOF searched Ruba and announced her arrest without providing any reason
for the arrest. Ruba was not allowed to say goodbye to her family or to
wear a jacket. She was then handcuffed by iron cuffs with her hands to
the front and blindfolded with a mask. Ruba was taken blindfolded and
cuffed on a military jeep for a long-distance until they reached an area
that she could no longer recognize. A military officer of the area
tried to provoke Ruba, taunting that, “the handcuffs are big on your
hands and very wide, and you are very small.”</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ruba was placed in the open air
until she was transferred the next morning to Ofer military camp, where
she was confined to a cell that lacked basic living conditions, with no
ventilation, a bed made of bricks, and roughly textured walls. </span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>After her interrogation, Ruba was transferred via the </span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>bosta</span></span></span></span></span></span><span><span><span><span><span><span>
to Hasharon Prison and Detention Center, where she was held in
difficult conditions, due in part to the poor quality of the food, and
the intentional delays by Israeli Prison Services (IPS) in responding to
her basic requests for water and food. The cell she was held in had no
ventilation or fan, and Ruba was only allowed to the yard for a period
of 1-1½ hours. The yard itself was a small courtyard with a closed
ceiling.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Since her arrest, Ruba underwent
three COVID-19 tests, without ever knowing the results of the tests.
Moreover, Ruba was forced to use the same mask since her arrest without
changing, despite asking several times for a change, for which she was
refused.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ruba was interrogated about her
activities with the Progressive Democratic Student Pole, her alleged
participation in rallies, community campaigns, and stone-throwing. The
military officer in charge of her interrogation threatened to keep her
in prison until 2025.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Legal Status</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ruba’s detention was extended by
Ofer Military Court on 12 July 2020, until 21 July 2020 when the
military prosecution submitted an indictment against Ruba that included
charges relating to her student and union activism, as well as her
membership in an “illegal” association under Israeli military orders
(the Progressive Democratic Student Pole), and charges of throwing
stones. The indictment laid against Ruba goes into minute detail on her
participation in activities such as a book supplies fair, the hanging of
flags and pictures of martyrs, selling books at discounted prices,
along with food and drink on behalf of the “illegal” association. </span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Nearly one year following her
arrest, and following the postponement of her court hearings on several
occasions, Ofer Military Court sentenced Ruba to a 21-month prison term,
in addition to 14-months suspended over 5 years on the charge of
membership in an organization deemed “illegal,” and a 5-month suspended
prison sentence for 5 years on the charge of attending a meeting of the
“illegal” association, a 12-month suspended prison sentence for 5 years
on the charge of throwing stones, along with a fine of 3,000 shekels.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Addameer’s lawyers filed an
appeal against the ruling, for which Ofer Military Court of Appeals
issued a decision on 13 September 2021 rejecting the appeal and
confirming Ruba’s sentence of 21 months in prison, noting that the
crimes for which she was convicted were “extremely dangerous to the
security and warranted severe punishment.” The appellate judge
emphasized that the court of the first instance, Ofer Military Court,
greatly reduced the detainee’s sentence, stating that there was no room
for further mitigation of the sentence. The military judge notes that
despite the detainee’s clean past, with the seriousness of the acts she
committed, there was no room for the Court of Appeals to interfere with
the ruling of the court of the first instance.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Selling Books and Stationaries...Dangerous Crimes</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Israeli occupation authorities
target their repressive policies against Palestinian university students
by arresting them, assaulting them, and imprisoning them on charges
related to their legitimate student and union activities. Such practices
deprive Palestinian students of their basic rights guaranteed under
international laws, charters, and conventions, most notably the right to
freedom of opinion, expression, and association.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Despite the fact that student and
union activity is legitimate and protected around the world, Israeli
occupation authorities systematically deny Palestinian students the
right to engage in such activities. Rather, they work to ban student
groups working in universities, prosecute their members, and charge them
with allegations relating to their work, and try them before military
courts that lack any semblance of justice and even the most basic of
fair trial standards.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>The military judge plays a
significant complementary role with the military prosecution. For it is
not enough for occupation authorities to file purely union and civil
charges against the students, but rather they must further emphasize the
alleged “severity” of the charges that necessitate imprisonment for
long months. Military judges fulfill this role by issuing long prison
sentences with corresponding legal opinions for charges such as selling
books and stationaries, participating in meetings, etc. The practice
applied by military courts in convicting students for exercising their
basic rights highlights the extent to which Israeli occupation
authorities violate fundamental obligations and rights under
international law. Moreover, it further signals the systematic and
complementary nature of the Israeli occupation forces, military
prosecution, and military judges, under the umbrella of the occupation
authorities, which systematically suppress all civil acts by claiming
that the seriousness of the activities impacts the security of the
region.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>The security-based justification
serves to shift attention, deter, and eliminate any political, union, or
social activity practiced by university students, amid the broader
suppression of the Palestinian people, in all their different
occupations, and preventing their right to self-determination and
liberation from the occupation. </span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ruba’s Childhood and Detention</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span>Ruba was only a little over two
years old when her family was harassed and her father, Fahmy Assi, was
arrested by the Israeli Occupation Forces. Her father, Fahmy, underwent
the agony of arbitrary administrative detention for many years, and Ruba
grew up at the doors of the Israeli occupation prisons waiting to visit
her dad. Now, she, too, is arbitrarily detained and deprived of her
basic right to complete her education, which now postpones the joy of
her graduation for another two years as she continues to be imprisoned
in Damon Prison. </span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
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