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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Centre, www.imemc.org, for Wednesday, December 9th, 2009.
Israeli troops kidnap ten Palestinians in the West Bank while a Palestinian ex-prisoner decides to sue an English filmmaker, these stories and more, coming up, stay tuned.
The News Cast
Israeli soldiers invaded the northern West Bank City of Nablus on Wednesday at dawn and kidnapped ten leaders and members of the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).
A senior PFLP source stated that the kidnappings took place amidst talks on the release of PFLP Secretary-General Ahmad Saadat as part of a prisoner-swap deal.
Some of the kidnapped leaders were identified as Mousa Salama, 47 and Wael Abu Al Sabe’, 45 in addition to Ziyad Al Sal’ous who was kidnapped at the military checkpoint as he was en-route back home from Ramallah.
Troops also kidnapped Myassar Atyani, 45, a human rights activists and an advocate for Palestinian detainees, and her brother Abdul-Nasser, 38. Local sources said that both were kidnapped from their home in the city.
In the nearby Al Ein refugee camp Israeli soldiers kidnapped Khalid Suleiman, Mohammad Dahbour, Yousef Rajab and Rabee’ Abu Khalifa, all of whom are believed to be members of the PFLP. In Awarta village, to the south of Nablus, Israeli soldiers broke into the home of Nabeeh Awwad, 47, and kidnapped him.
These kidnappings come as the PFLP is preparing to celebrate its 41st anniversary on December 12.
In other news, former political prisoner from Beit Sahour, Ayman Abu Aita, has threatened to file a lawsuit against filmmaker and actor Sacha Baron Cohen for misrepresenting him as ‘a leader of the terrorist group al-Aqsa brigades’ in his new comedy ‘Bruno’.
Abu Aita, now a grocery store owner, was imprisoned by Israel for a number of years on what he says were trumped-up charges of inciting violence. In prison, he was often isolated and beaten by the guards for organizing hunger strikes among the prisoners to lobby for better conditions.
Also in the West Bank, Israeli authorities agreed to release the body of Mashour Al-Arouri, a Palestinian killed by Israeli troops in 1976. The Israeli high court ruled that the body should be released after Israel kept it for 33 years for unknown reasons.
The ruling came as the family appealed to the high court as part of a Palestinian national campaign to retrieve bodies of Palestinians killed by the Israeli military during resistance operations.
The body will be retrieved after the DNA checks have been conducted to confirm the identity. The ruling said, in case the body will not be retrieved for burial for technical reasons, the family will be granted permission to visit the grave, an issue that raises scepticism, since authorization to enter Israel is rarely granted to Palestinians.
Conclusion
Thank you for joining us from occupied Bethlehem, you have been listening to Palestine Today from the International Middle East Media Center www.imemc.org this report has been brought to you by, George Rishmawi.
