Local protest leader, Naji Tamimi, was abducted during a night raid on the village of Nabi Saleh by the Israeli military, according to a statement by the Popular Committee Against the Wall and Settlements, along with local eyewitnesses.Dozens of Israeli soldiers invaded Nabi Saleh village, north of Ramallah, at approximately 1:30 a.m. on Sunday morning and abducted 47 year old Naji Tamimi from his home while he was sleeping.
Tamimi is known to be an organizer of the weekly non-violent anti-Wall protests in Nabi Saleh, where villagers have organized to oppose the land annexation by the nearby Israeli settlement of Halamish.
In the same invasion, Israeli troops also broke into the home of Bassem Tamimi, another leading activist in the Nabi Saleh popular committee who was not home at the time of the raid. His wife Nariman, after being woken up by the soldiers, opened the door holding a video camera and filming. The soldiers confiscated the camera after she refused to stop filming. They conducted an hour long, meticulous house search and then left the premises.
In the last five weeks, the Israeli military has abducted sixteen residents of Nabi Saleh under the suspicion of participating in weekly non-violent protests in the village. Half of the abductees were minors, the youngest aged 11 years old.
The abductions were conducted on the basis of incriminations extracted from a fourteen year-old boy from Nabi Saleh, who was recently abducted and subjected to verbal and emotional pressure during his interrogation.
Ever since the start of the village’s struggle against Israeli annexation of their land, in December of 2009, the Israeli army has abducted 63 villagers associated with the weekly protests in the village.
Tamimi’s arrest is part of an extensive campaign by the Israeli military targeting protest leaders all around the West Bank, as in the case of the villages of Bil’in and Ni’ilin. Protest organizer Abdullah Abu Rahme from Bil’in is another example of someone abducted by Israeli forces after extracting false accusations against him from children subjected to torture. He has been imprisoned for over a year, despite the complete lack of evidence against him.
