Jacob Gough reports that the Israelis have freed two of three members of the Jenin Freedom Theatre whom they arrested without charges weeks back.
Meantime, they have arrested yet another member of the theater in another nighttime raid. There are post-raid photographs of Mohammed Nagnaghiya’s house here on Facebook, including one of feces left by the Israeli attack dogs.
The head of the Friends of Jenin Freedom Theatre, Constance Romilly, told me yesterday that the arrests have nothing to do with solving the murder of Juliano Mer-Khamis last April. “They don’t like the Freedom Theatre because it brings in too many internationals, to work and to help.”
An Israeli court ordered the men released, Romilly said, but Israeli forces treated the men abusively — denying them access to lawyers for weeks and taunting them with food during Ramadan fasts. And she described the Kafkaesque treatment of young actor Rami Hwayel, whom the Israelis arrested in early August and continue to hold. Under questioning, he said that he had entered Israel without a permit, and so he was charged with that crime, the crime of freedom of movement.
“Every young man has entered Israel without permission at some time, but this was a face-saving move by the Israelis– to charge him with this,” she said.
Here is Richard Lightbown at Palestine Chronicle, reporting on the latest arrest:
On 22 August at approximately 2:00 in the morning the IDF again raided the Freedom Theatre and the home of the Nagnaghiya family. Summoned by neighbours, Jacob Gough returned to the theatre where he was threatened with violence if he did not withdraw. After a second attempt he was forced to strip at gunpoint, detained and threatened with beating if he spoke. Meanwhile the theatre’s security guard (Mohammed, brother of Adnan Nagnaghiya) was beaten in his home, all three floors of which were ransacked before he was taken away in handcuffs. By this time youths had gathered and begun to throw stones. As they left the army attempted to disperse the crowd by firing live ammunition.
Theatre co-founder Jonatan Stanczak commented:
“This behaviour is mounting to systematic harassment of The Freedom Theatre by The Israeli army, it is scandalous. This proves that the Israeli army and security apparatus is either lost in their investigation or that they have the actual intention of damaging the theatre. It also seems that after the murder of Juliano Mer Khamis the Freedom Theatre is no longer exempted from the kind of oppression the Palestinian society is subjected to in general.”
