SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Mays Abu Ghosh embraces a loved one just after her release from 15 months in torturous Israeli custody on November 30, 2020. (Photo: Ultra Palestine/YouTube screen grab)
Israel Releases Mays Abu Ghosh, Palestinian Student Jailed for Membership in Leftist Campus Group
Abu Ghosh—imprisoned for 15 months after joining a banned college organization that opposes Israel's illegal occupation—described torture by her jailers.
Nov 30, 2020
A Palestinian journalism student imprisoned by Israeli security forces for joining a banned leftist campus group was released Monday after 15 months behind bars.
"I want to tell everyone what happened with me during the interrogation and torture period. Not as something that has happened to me but for any Palestinian to know what to expect when Israel arrests them."
--Mays Abu Ghosh
Palestine Chronicle reports 23-year-old Mays Abu Ghosh of the Qalandiya refugee camp in the illegally occupied West Bank was taken from Damon Prison to the Israeli military checkpoint at Jalameh, where she was released into the arms of waiting relatives and other former female prisoners of the occupation forces.
Abu Ghosh, who studied at Birzeit University, was arrested in August 2019 and charged with being a member of the Democratic Progressive Student Pole, the campus arm of the Marxist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the second-largest Palestine Liberation Organization faction after Fatah.
Democratic Progressive Student Pole is banned by Israeli occupation forces as a "terrorist organization," which critics say is a dubious designation divorced from the reality of the group's nonviolent collegiate activities.
According to the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, such "arbitrary designations may be issued at any time by an Israeli military commander of occupation forces in the West Bank, and are used as a pretext to round up, detain, and violently attack Palestinian organizations and movements."
"Almost all Palestinian political parties are similarly labeled by the Israeli occupation," the group added.
Al Jazeera reports Abu Ghosh was also charged with "communicating with an enemy" for participating in a conference on the right of return of the more than 700,000 refugees ethnically cleansed from Palestine during and after the period when Israel declared its independence in 1948.
Abu Ghosh was imprisoned in the notorious Maskobiyeh interrogation center in Jerusalem, where she said she endured torture including stress positions, slapping, being forced to listen to the screams of other prisoners being tortured, and threats that she would be sent home paralyzed or mentally broken.
"I want to tell everyone what happened with me during the interrogation and torture period," Abu Ghosh told Al Jazeera on Tuesday. "Not as something that has happened to me but for any Palestinian to know what to expect when Israel arrests them."
Abu Ghosh isn't the first member of her family to be targeted by Israel. In January 2016 her 16-year-old brother was killed by occupation forces for perpetrating a stabbing attack. Israeli troops destroyed her family's home after the incident, a common practice condemned by Israeli and international human rights groups, the United Nations, and others as an illegal form of collective punishment.
In 2019 Abu Ghosh's parents were interrogated and her 17-year-old brother was held in administrative detention--imprisonment without charge or trial--for four months.
Addameer, an advocacy group for Palestinian prisoners, says 40 women are among the more than 4,500 Palestinians were jailed by Israel as of last month, with around 370 of them held in administrative detention.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
A Palestinian journalism student imprisoned by Israeli security forces for joining a banned leftist campus group was released Monday after 15 months behind bars.
"I want to tell everyone what happened with me during the interrogation and torture period. Not as something that has happened to me but for any Palestinian to know what to expect when Israel arrests them."
--Mays Abu Ghosh
Palestine Chronicle reports 23-year-old Mays Abu Ghosh of the Qalandiya refugee camp in the illegally occupied West Bank was taken from Damon Prison to the Israeli military checkpoint at Jalameh, where she was released into the arms of waiting relatives and other former female prisoners of the occupation forces.
Abu Ghosh, who studied at Birzeit University, was arrested in August 2019 and charged with being a member of the Democratic Progressive Student Pole, the campus arm of the Marxist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the second-largest Palestine Liberation Organization faction after Fatah.
Democratic Progressive Student Pole is banned by Israeli occupation forces as a "terrorist organization," which critics say is a dubious designation divorced from the reality of the group's nonviolent collegiate activities.
According to the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, such "arbitrary designations may be issued at any time by an Israeli military commander of occupation forces in the West Bank, and are used as a pretext to round up, detain, and violently attack Palestinian organizations and movements."
"Almost all Palestinian political parties are similarly labeled by the Israeli occupation," the group added.
Al Jazeera reports Abu Ghosh was also charged with "communicating with an enemy" for participating in a conference on the right of return of the more than 700,000 refugees ethnically cleansed from Palestine during and after the period when Israel declared its independence in 1948.
Abu Ghosh was imprisoned in the notorious Maskobiyeh interrogation center in Jerusalem, where she said she endured torture including stress positions, slapping, being forced to listen to the screams of other prisoners being tortured, and threats that she would be sent home paralyzed or mentally broken.
"I want to tell everyone what happened with me during the interrogation and torture period," Abu Ghosh told Al Jazeera on Tuesday. "Not as something that has happened to me but for any Palestinian to know what to expect when Israel arrests them."
Abu Ghosh isn't the first member of her family to be targeted by Israel. In January 2016 her 16-year-old brother was killed by occupation forces for perpetrating a stabbing attack. Israeli troops destroyed her family's home after the incident, a common practice condemned by Israeli and international human rights groups, the United Nations, and others as an illegal form of collective punishment.
In 2019 Abu Ghosh's parents were interrogated and her 17-year-old brother was held in administrative detention--imprisonment without charge or trial--for four months.
Addameer, an advocacy group for Palestinian prisoners, says 40 women are among the more than 4,500 Palestinians were jailed by Israel as of last month, with around 370 of them held in administrative detention.
From Your Site Articles
A Palestinian journalism student imprisoned by Israeli security forces for joining a banned leftist campus group was released Monday after 15 months behind bars.
"I want to tell everyone what happened with me during the interrogation and torture period. Not as something that has happened to me but for any Palestinian to know what to expect when Israel arrests them."
--Mays Abu Ghosh
Palestine Chronicle reports 23-year-old Mays Abu Ghosh of the Qalandiya refugee camp in the illegally occupied West Bank was taken from Damon Prison to the Israeli military checkpoint at Jalameh, where she was released into the arms of waiting relatives and other former female prisoners of the occupation forces.
Abu Ghosh, who studied at Birzeit University, was arrested in August 2019 and charged with being a member of the Democratic Progressive Student Pole, the campus arm of the Marxist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the second-largest Palestine Liberation Organization faction after Fatah.
Democratic Progressive Student Pole is banned by Israeli occupation forces as a "terrorist organization," which critics say is a dubious designation divorced from the reality of the group's nonviolent collegiate activities.
According to the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, such "arbitrary designations may be issued at any time by an Israeli military commander of occupation forces in the West Bank, and are used as a pretext to round up, detain, and violently attack Palestinian organizations and movements."
"Almost all Palestinian political parties are similarly labeled by the Israeli occupation," the group added.
Al Jazeera reports Abu Ghosh was also charged with "communicating with an enemy" for participating in a conference on the right of return of the more than 700,000 refugees ethnically cleansed from Palestine during and after the period when Israel declared its independence in 1948.
Abu Ghosh was imprisoned in the notorious Maskobiyeh interrogation center in Jerusalem, where she said she endured torture including stress positions, slapping, being forced to listen to the screams of other prisoners being tortured, and threats that she would be sent home paralyzed or mentally broken.
"I want to tell everyone what happened with me during the interrogation and torture period," Abu Ghosh told Al Jazeera on Tuesday. "Not as something that has happened to me but for any Palestinian to know what to expect when Israel arrests them."
Abu Ghosh isn't the first member of her family to be targeted by Israel. In January 2016 her 16-year-old brother was killed by occupation forces for perpetrating a stabbing attack. Israeli troops destroyed her family's home after the incident, a common practice condemned by Israeli and international human rights groups, the United Nations, and others as an illegal form of collective punishment.
In 2019 Abu Ghosh's parents were interrogated and her 17-year-old brother was held in administrative detention--imprisonment without charge or trial--for four months.
Addameer, an advocacy group for Palestinian prisoners, says 40 women are among the more than 4,500 Palestinians were jailed by Israel as of last month, with around 370 of them held in administrative detention.
From Your Site Articles
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.