Ramallah 20th February 2013: MADA center organized, in collaboration with the Palestinian Ministry of Information and Journalists’ Syndicate, a protest this morning in front of Ofer prison near the city of Ramallah. The protest was against the policy of detaining journalists practiced by the Israeli occupation forces (IOF), and it coincided with the trial of Shehab agency reporter Amer Abu Arfah’s who is under an administrative detention since 21st August 2011.
Mousa Rimawi the general director of MADA center stated that the policy of detaining journalists has been going on for decades, where Israeli occupation authorities carried out 27 cases of journalists’ arrest during the last two years, and has released most of them. Rimawi adds that the persistence of Israel policy is a blatant violation of the law and the international conventions that ensured freedom of expression. Today’s protest was held to demand the release of the detained journalists and to protest against this policy. A new manifestation of this policy was the arrest of a cartoonist of Alhayat al Jadeda newspaper Mohammed Saba'na last Saturday 16th February 2013, whose detention was renewed for another 9 days at Aljalama prison today.
On the other hand, the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) prevented three journalists yesterday from covering the IOF raiding of Aldoha town near Bethlehem.
Alquds TV correspondent Mamdouh Hamamra told MADA, that him and his colleagues PalMedia cameraman Samer Hamad and Alquds Dot Com Cameraman Abdulrahman Younis went to cover the IOF raiding operation of Aldoha town, and once their cameras were turned on they were stopped from covering by the IOF, and they were checked for identifications and Press IDs. Hamamra also added, “They prevented us from continuing the coverage of the operation, and even erased any footage Abdulrahman managed to take”.
Rimawi called on the international community for an immediate intervention, in order to force Israel to stop all attacks on journalists, which puts journalists’ lives in danger and prevents them from performing their professional duty, especially since the attacks significantly escalated over the past year and at the beginning of this year.
