. . . ❶― (a) Dareen Tatour, Palestinian poet imprisoned by Israel for social media posts, shares her story
- Background: “Did Facebook intentionally block profiles of Palestinian journalists?” Christian Science Monitor.
❷ Israeli court extends detention of Palestinian football team board member over photo
❸ Israeli PM slams B’Tselem recent statement to UN on settlements
❹ ‘When the media doesn’t talk to Arabs, coverage of them is negative’
❺ POETRY by Dareen Tatour
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❶ REPORT: ISRAEL DETAINING PALESTINIAN MINORS WITHOUT CHARGE OVER FACEBOOK POSTS
Ma’an News Agency
Oct. 17, 2016
At least five Palestinian minors have been imprisoned by Israel without being charged in recent months, after sharing social media posts that Israeli authorities alleged amounted to “incitement” to commit violence, according to a report released Monday by rights group Defense for Children International – Palestine (DCIP).
___Among them was a 17-year-old identified as Ahmad H., who told DCIP that he was interrogated twice in the first week of August for one and three hours, during which time he had neither a parent present nor access to legal counsel. More . . .
. . . ❶― (a) DAREEN TATOUR, PALESTINIAN POET IMPRISONED BY ISRAEL FOR SOCIAL MEDIA POSTS, SHARES HER STORY
Salon
Ben Norton
Aug. 10, 2016
Dareen Tatour, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, was arrested because of her posts on social media.
___In October, police raided her home in the middle of the night. They handcuffed Tatour, a 35-year-old poet, and took her away.
___“You look like a terrorist,” an interrogator told her. The Israeli government accused Tatour of inciting violence with her poetry and Facebook posts. More . . .
- Amanda Hoover. “Did Facebook intentionally block profiles of Palestinian journalists?” Christian Science Monitor 26 Sept. 2016: N.PAG. Full article.
[. . . .] The latest complaints came from four editors at the Shebab News Agency and three executives at Quds News Network, Al Jazeera reported. Quds has about 3.7 million Facebook followers, and has a reputation for being affiliated with Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian militant group and Shehab has about 4.2 million followers and is regarded by Palestinians as being linked with Hamas, a militant group that denies Israel’s right to exist. Both publications, which have several million likes on Facebook each, cover daily news in the occupied West Bank region.
___”[Sharek-Quds News Agency] does not publish anything that violates Facebook standards or that could annoy governments,” Nisreen al-Khatib, a translator and journalist at the Quds News Network, told Al Jazeera. “But still, we are targeted.”
___Since the complaint, Facebook has reinstated several of the accounts, claiming that their censorship was accidental.
___”The pages were removed in error and restored as soon as we were able to investigate,” a Facebook spokesperson tells The Christian Science Monitor in a statement. “Our team processes millions of reports each week, and we sometimes get things wrong. We’re very sorry about this mistake.”
___Two weeks ago, Israeli officials announced an agreement with Facebook that would allow the two entities to combat online incitement in tandem. The agreement came after multiple requests from Israel that the company find a way to monitor the content on its platform and remove any likely to incite violence.
___In the past, Israeli officials have reported anti-Israel bias on Facebook, as The Christian Science Monitor reported:
___In December, the Tel Aviv-based Israel Law Center conducted an experiment in which it created two Facebook pages: “Stop Palestinians” and “Stop Israel.” Similar content was posted on both pages, including political cartoons with the respective captions “Death to all the Jews” and “Death to all the Arabs.”It then reported both pages to see if either would be removed. The anti-Palestinian page was shut down the same day it was reported, but the anti-Israel page was not.
___During the four months leading up to the agreement with Israel, Facebook had already agreed to remove 95 percent of the 158 posts Israeli officials flagged, Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said. [. . . .]
❷ ISRAELI COURT EXTENDS DETENTION OF PALESTINIAN FOOTBALL TEAM BOARD MEMBER OVER PHOTO
Ma’an News Agency
Oct. 17, 2016 An Israeli magistrate’s court extended the detention of a Palestinian man who serves on the administrative board of an occupied East Jerusalem football team on Sunday evening, after Israeli officials accused him of publicly supporting “terrorism.” ___Lawyer Muhammad Mahmoud of prisoners’ rights group Addameer told Ma’an on Sunday evening that a Jerusalem court had extended to Wednesday the remand of Maher Abu Sneina, an administrative member of the Palestinian Hilal al-Quds football team. More . . .
❸ ISRAELI PM SLAMS B’TSELEM RECENT STATEMENT TO UN ON SETTLEMENTS
Alray-Palestinian Media Agency
Oct. 18, 2016
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem on Saturday, accusing it joining the “chorus of slander” against Israel. ___Netanyahu’s position came after the human rights NGO participated in informal UN Security Council session on Friday in which its representative slammed Israeli settlements in the West Bank, calling them obstacles to peace. More . . .
❹ ‘WHEN THE MEDIA DOESN’T TALK TO ARABS, COVERAGE OF THEM IS NEGATIVE’
+972 Magazine from The Seventh Eye*
Oren Persico
Oct. 16, 2016
* The Seventh Eye is Israel’s only independent media watchdog, since 1996.
The participation of Arab interviewees in Israeli news items relating to Arab society in the country has a correlation on the content and tone of the reporting, new research published by Israeli NGO Sikkuy last month has concluded. (Full disclosure: The Seventh Eye partnered with Sikkuy for its ‘Representation Index’ project.)
___The research project, conducted by Edan Ring along with the Ifat Group, examined news coverage of Arab citizens of Israel in the Hebrew-language media during October 2015, a month in which a serious escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict took place, including almost daily attacks against Jewish Israelis. More . . .
“A Poet Behind Bars,” By Dareen Tatour
Translated by Tariq al HaydarIn prison, I met people
too numerous to count:
Killer and criminal,
thief and liar,
the honest and those who disbelieve,
the lost and confused,
the wretched and the hungry.
Then, the sick of my homeland,
born out of pain,
refused to go along with injustice
until they became children whose innocence was violated.
The world’s compulsion left them stunned.
They grew older.
No, their sadness grew,
strengthening with repression,
like roses in salted soil.
They embraced love without fear,
and were condemned for declaring,
“We love the land endlessly,”
oblivious to their deeds…
So their love freed them.
See, prison is for lovers.
I interrogated my soul
during moments of doubt and distraction:
“What of your crime?”
Its meaning escapes me now.
I said the thing and
revealed my thoughts;
I wrote about the current injustice,
wishes in ink,
a poem I wrote…
The charge has worn my body,
from my toes to the top of my head,
for I am a poet in prison,
a poet in the land of art.
I am accused of words,
my pen the instrument.
Ink— blood of the heart— bears witness
and reads the charges.
Listen, my destiny, my life,
to what the judge said:
A poem stands accused,
my poem morphs into a crime.
In the land of freedom,
the artist’s fate is prison.
—Written on: November 2, 2015, Jelemeh Prison
Palestine InSight 