Hamas arrests 7 for videoconference with Israel peace activists
Still taken from a Zoom conference between people living in Gaza and Israel. Image by Zoom
(JTA) — Hamas authorities have arrested seven Gaza residents for participating in a videoconference with peace campaigners in Israel.
The arrests, which Hamas confirmed and defended as rooted in national security, have triggered a debate in Palestinian society over free speech and prompted multiple condemnations.
Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip, bans many forms of communications with Israel and what it calls the “normalization” of relations with the Jewish state.
“We absolutely condemn arrests of individuals because of practicing their right to peaceful expression and assembly,” Saleh Hijazi, the Amnesty International human rights group’s deputy director for the Middle East, told the London-based Asharq al-Awsat newspaper.
Rami Aman, 36, the founder of the Gaza Youth Committee, and the six others were accused of treason after speaking on Zoom to the dozens of Israeli activists last week, the newspaper reported Tuesday. The participants discussed their daily lives and expressed hopes for better leadership for both Israelis and Palestinians.
Hind Khoudary, a former Amnesty International activist, reportedly played a key role in having the seven arrested, according to Asharq al-Awsat. She criticized Aman on Facebook over what Khoudary called “normalization” with Israel and also tagged several Hamas officials in the online post, prompting them to monitor the call, according to Asharq al-Awsat.
The post Hamas arrests 7 Gazans for videoconference with Israel peace activists appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
A message from our CEO & publisher 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.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
