American peace activist arrested inTel-Aviv, about to be deported

[Gush Shalom (Israeli Peace Bloc)]

GUSH SHALOM pob 3322, Tel-Aviv www.gush-shalom.org


Press Release 5/12/2003

American peace activist Radika Sainath has been detained by police  
yesterday afternoon in Tel-Aviv and is held in the deportation cells at Ben-
Gurion Airport, in preparation for being deported from the country. This 
morning (Friday, Dec, 5) at 9.00 AM, her lawyer, Adv. Shamai Leibovitz, 
will appeal to the Duty Detentions Judge at room 359 of the Tel-Aviv 
Courts Building (corner of Weitzmann and King Saul, Tel-Aviv). 

Gush Shalom (Israeli Peace Bloc) and other groups appealed to their 
activists to be present at the courtroom to exprss their solidarity, and of 
course there will be there members of  the ISM (International Solidarity 
Movement) to which Radika Sainath belongs.

Sainath was picked up by police yesterday afternoon, soon after leaving 
the same court building - but then she had been there in a completely 
different capacity, as a witness in the compensation suit she had 
presented against the Israeli police, asking for 50,000 Shekels (about 
$10,000) in damages for wrongful detention. 

The suit referred to events taking place a year ago, in November 2002, at 
the West Bank village of Jayous, on whose lands a section of Sharon's  
"Separation Wall" was being built at the time, causing the outright 
confiscation of village lands, the cutting down of numerous olive trees 
and destruction of various agricultural installations, and also involving the 
threat - since then realized - of cutting the villagers off from much of their 
land which was not officially confiscated. 

Radika Sainath had been among a large group of international and Israeli 
activists which joined the Jayous villagers in a non-violent protest march. 
The army commander on the spot ordered the demonstrators to disperse - 
but before they even had time to think whether or not to obey, the soldiers 
opened up with tear gas and "rubber" bullets (i.e., rubber-coated metal 
bullets). Afterwards, police roughly pushed Sainath and several fellow 
demonstrators down on the ground, handcuffed them and took them off to 
the Ariel Police Station, where she spent 30 hours until the Supreme Court 
in Jerusalem ordered her release. 

Judge David Geldstein of the Tel-Aviv court listened patiently when she 
related at length all of the above. When she mentioned the army 
onslaught, the judge asked: "But why did you not run away?" to which 
Sainath answered: "We could not. We had come there in order to defend 
the Palestinian villagers,  to insert ourselves between them and the army - 
because we knew that the soldiers might be far more rough to them them 
to citizens of Israel or of Western countries". 

Later, the state representative tried to depict Sainath as "a provocateur 
who is in the habit of lying down in front of bulldozers" and described the 
ISM as "an anti-Israeli organization". But the judge did not seem 
impressed, stating: "What she may have done or not done at other times 
and places is not relevant here, nor is the ideology of organizations to 
which she may belong. So far, as regards the facts of the case here 
considered, I heard evidence indicating that she was engaged in a lawful, 
non-violent protest which was wrongly broken up. I have yet to hear 
evidence to the contrary". The judge added, however, an aside to Sainath 
herself: "You see how enlightened is the state of Israel. Which other state 
would have allowed you to sue it in this way?". Then he fixed the next 
session for April 2004, when the state is supposed to bring testimonies 
from the soldiers and police who were at Jayous on that day.

All seemed over for the day. Sainath and her friends went out of the court 
building and boarded a bus. Two men - who later turned out to be plain-
clothes police - boarded the bus after them. When they got off,  the two 
again followed, approached Sainath, told her she was under arrest for 
being illegally in Israeli territory, used some force to beat off the Israeli and 
international activists present, and then pushed her into an unmarked car 
and whisked her off directly to the cells at Ben Gurion Airport. It seems 
these two were adept at such operations, being - as it turned out - 
members of the notorious Immigration Police which is terrorizing migrant 
workes, kidnapping them off the streets as well as in midnight raids to 
apartements in the slums of south Tel-Aviv.  

The authorities intended to put Radika Sainath on a plane then and there,  
but quick action by her Israeli lawyer  Shamai Leibovitz gained a temporary 
injunction, pending this morning's session. "This is pure, small-minded 
vindictivness on the part of the police" says Leibovitz, a veteran of 
numerous hard-fought human rights cases. "It is true that her visa expired 
some days ago. She openly declared this to the court, saying that she 
extended her stay in order to testify at her compensations suit and 
showing the court the return ticket she has for December 12 and which she 
fully intends to use. This arrest and attmepted deportation is pure 
vindictivness, they were so angry that she dared sue them that they 
wanted to get back at her at all costs." 

For updates on the case, call Adv. Leibovitz +972-64-414505,  Ronen 
Edelman +972-53-561580, Adam Keller +972-3-5565804 or +-972-56-709603.

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Petitions against the Wall:

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