European Lawmakers Protest Hosting Relatives Of Jailed Palestinians

Image by getty images

By JTA July 6, 2017

(JTA) — Lawmakers from 15 E.U. member countries protested the hosting at the European Parliament of relatives of Palestinians who are in jail for murdering Israelis in terrorist attacks.

The 17 European Parliament lawmakers from Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and 11 other countries expressed their opposition to the move in an open letter they sent Thursday to European Parliament President Antonio Tajani. The letter was about the scheduled hosting that day in Brussels of relatives of Marwan Barghouti and Ahmad Sa’adat by members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for relations with Palestine.

“We are utterly appalled,” wrote the cosignatories, including Fulvio Martusciello, chair of the European Parliament’s Delegation for relations with Israel, by the “offering of a public platform to relatives of convicted terrorists.”

Barghouti, a PLO militant, was sentenced by an Israeli court in 2004 to multiple life sentences for planning dozens of deadly terrorist attacks. Some observers of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict believe that among Palestinians, Barghouti possesses credibility that other leaders lack, and may therefore be capable of implementing compromises that may facilitate a peace agreement with Israel. Sa’adat, who was arrested in 2006, was the secretary-general of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist group and one of the planners of the murder Rehavam Ze’evi, a Israeli cabinet minister, in 2001.

The European Parliament’s Delegation for relations with Palestine invited Barghouti’s wife, Fadwa, and Sa’adat’s daughter, Sumoud, to a discussion Thursday about “the situation of the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails after the hunger-strike,” as the organizers of that debate described it.

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

The coming year promises to be filled with more complex and historic developments. We are entering an era where independent, fact-based Jewish journalism will be more important than ever. We need to be ready for whatever 2025 will bring, and with your help, we can be.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO