11 June 2014

Israel : The Issawi family, a life of persecutions

Issawi FamilyFor nearly 10 years now, the Issawi family has not been durably reunited. Because of the political activism of their children, the Issawi's parents have seen them successively arrested or questioned by the Israel police. The latest ones, Shireen, a young lawyer, and her brothers, Shadi and Medhat, were arrested in March 2014 by the Israel police.

Medhat's activism had already caused him to be sentenced to 20 years in prison. He had been released in late 2013, few days before the release of his brother Samer, after a 266-day hunger strike. The latter has become, through his activism, a symbol of peaceful protest against the conditions of detentions of Palestinians in Israel. Shireen had also personally invested herself in the release of political detainees of whom she was amongst the spokespersons.

Her activism against Israel policies of detention was certainly the reason of her arrest and of her two brothers', last March. They all were held incommunicado and relentlessly questioned by the authorities and still have not been officially charged. If Shadi has been released on bail, Shireen and Medhat were denied this right, demonstrating the fierce retaliation against them.

In the course of their administrative detention, they were brought several times before a court that continuously postponed their case sine die and without motives.

Consequently, Alkarama has submitted a communication to the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to request the Israeli authorities to immediately release Shireen and Medhat. To date, thousands of Palestinians are being detained under the administrative detention regime, in violation of their fundamental rights. It recently led UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, to urge Israel to clarify their situations.