Israel deports Palestinian lawyer Salah Hamouri to France on safety grounds, Inside Ministry says By Reuters



© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Salah Hamouri, 26, one among 550 Palestinian prisoners freed to strike a deal during which Israel freed 1,027 prisoners for soldier Gilad Shalit who has been held captive within the Gaza Strip for greater than 5 years , reveals his French passport throughout a

By Emily Rose

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel deported Franco-Palestinian human rights lawyer Salah Hamouri to France on Sunday, accusing him of safety breaches, Israel’s Inside Ministry mentioned in an announcement.

Hamouri, 37, a lifelong Jerusalem resident, was escorted to the airport the place he boarded an early morning flight to France along with his supporters saying there was no authorized recourse to take.

Israel revoked Hamouri’s residency on December 1 on costs of being lively within the Widespread Entrance for the Liberation of Palestine, categorised by Israel and its Western allies as a terrorist group.

He had beforehand been convicted by Israel of making an attempt to assassinate Sephardic Rabbi Ovadia Yossef, the founding father of the ultra-Orthodox Shas get together, however he has all the time maintained his innocence.

“Throughout his life he organized, impressed and deliberate to hold out terrorist assaults for himself and for the group in opposition to well-known residents and Israelis,” an Inside Ministry assertion mentioned.

Hamouri’s supporters mentioned the deportation was a violation of worldwide legislation.

“Wherever a Palestinian goes, he carries with him these rules and the reason for his folks: his homeland carried with him wherever he finds himself,” Hamouri mentioned in an announcement.

Hamouri, who was not too long ago held by Israel in administrative detention with out cost from March 7 to December 1.

Hamouri was one among 1,027 prisoners Israel launched in 2011 in trade for soldier Gilad Shalit, who was held captive by Hamas within the Gaza Strip for greater than 5 years.

Hamouri holds French nationality by means of his mom.

The French Overseas Ministry denounced his expulsion and mentioned the French authorities had actively sought to defend his rights and had been in touch with the Israeli authorities on a number of events.

“We condemn the Israeli authorities’ choice in opposition to the legislation to deport Salah Hamouri to France,” the ministry mentioned in an announcement.

The overwhelming majority of East Jerusalem’s greater than 340,000 Palestinians maintain Israeli residency permits, however few maintain Israeli citizenship, which considers the whole holy metropolis its undivided everlasting capital. Palestinians have lengthy sought the east of the town, which Israel captured in a 1967 struggle and later annexed in an internationally unrecognized transfer, because the capital of a future state.

Jessica Montell, government director of HaMoked, an NGO that represents Hamouri, informed Reuters that Hamouri’s case units a precedent for the deportation of Jerusalem residents who maintain different citizenship.

“As a result of he holds a second nationality, it makes him extra weak to deportation,” Montell mentioned, including that she expects comparable circumstances to emerge extra ceaselessly with a brand new right-wing coalition anticipated to type. the subsequent Israeli authorities.

Ahmed Majdalani, a member of the Govt Committee of the Palestine Liberation Group, known as the expulsion unlawful.

“He didn’t commit any crime to be deported from his native nation and deported to a different nation, the place he stayed for a short while, despite the fact that he holds the citizenship of this nation,” Majdalani informed Reuters.