Court extends detention of three youths from destroyed village of Iqrit following raid and assaults by ILA officials
On Monday 9 June 2014, the Krayot Magistrates’ Court decided to extend the detention of Nidal Khoury until Wednesday, 11 June 2014, and to transfer Walaa' Sbeit and Jeries Khayat to house arrest until Monday, 16 June 2014. The three youth activists were arrested on the morning of 8 June in the destroyed Palestinian village of Iqrit, after ILA officials demolished the youth's tents and other properties in the area.
On Monday 9 June 2014, the Krayot Magistrates’ Court decided to extend the detention of Nidal Khoury until Wednesday, 11 June 2014, and to transfer Walaa' Sbeit and Jeries Khayat to house arrest until Monday, 16 June 2014. The three youth activists were arrested on the morning of 8 June in the destroyed Palestinian village of Iqrit, after ILA officials demolished the youth's tents and other properties in the area.
The detainees are part of a community of Palestinian descendants of displaced residents from Iqrit, a Palestinian village in the north of Israel that was forcibly depopulated by the Israeli military in 1948. Despite a Supreme Court ruling in 1951 that ordered the state to allow the displaced residents to return to their homes, the state destroyed all the buildings in the village, except for the church and cemetery, and refused to allow the villagers to resettle on their land. Since August 2012, the village’s youths have returned to Iqrit and remained on their ancestral land, demanding that their right to return and live in their village be recognized and fulfilled.
The police charged the three youth activists with trespassing on property owned by the Israel Land Authority (ILA) and with obstructing the work of public employees. The police also charged one of the youths with assaulting a public employee, and charged another with threatening a public employee. The police issued the charges after ILA officials forcefully entered Iqrit, destroyed the tents and shacks built by the youths, and confiscated the youth’s belongings, although they attended Iqrit without and attended the area without an evacuation permit.
Adalah Attorney's Aram Mahameed and Suhad Bishara represented the three detainees in court. Attorney Mahameed visited the youths early afternoon on 9 June 2014 to check their situation and to provide them with legal advice. After exiting the Nahariya Police Station where the detainees were being held, Mahameed said that there were “signs of violence on the bodies of two of the detainees as a result of assaults by the ILA officials”.
Read more:
Adalah PR, “Ambassadors and diplomats visit depopulated Palestinian village of Iqrit in Israel”, 15 May 2013
