Palestinians call for protest demanding justice in Banat killing
PA threatens to fire employees who condemn death of anti-corruption activist
Palestinian political activists have called for holding another protest in Ramallah on Sunday afternoon to demand that those responsible for the death of Palestinian Authority critic Nizar Banat be held accountable.
The activists said that they will also protest against the ongoing PA security crackdown against political opponents, social media users and journalists in the West Bank.
Last week, PA security forces banned a similar protest that was supposed to take place in the center of Ramallah and detained several activists.
Some of the protesters, including five women, later complained that they had been beaten, sexually harassed and detained by PA security officers.
Banat, a prominent critic of the PA, was pronounced dead shortly after more than 20 Palestinian officers raided the house where he was sleeping in Hebron on June 24. His family accused the officers of beating him to death with rifle butts and iron bars.
On Friday, hundreds of Palestinians again demonstrated in Hebron in protest Banat’s death, chanting slogans calling for the downfall of the PA leadership.
The protesters accused the authority of failing to take real action to punish those involved in the violent death of Banat, who was a candidate on the Freedom and Dignity electoral list for the Palestinian parliamentary election that was supposed to have taken place on May 22.
A committee set up by the PA government to investigate the circumstances that led to the activist’s death found that 14 officers were involved in the incident. But it has not published its findings, and it remains unclear whether any of the officers have been arrested or brought to trial.
A PA official in Ramallah said over the weekend that Hamas, Hizb ut Tahrir and the PLO’s Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) – together with ousted Fatah operative Mohammed Dahlan, who is based in the United Arab Emirates – were behind the protests that followed Banat’s death.
Hizb ut Tahrir, which has several thousand supporters in Hebron, is an international pan-Islamist and fundamentalist political organization whose declared goal is to unite Muslims under the rule of one Islamic caliphate.
The official warned that the PA would not hesitate to use an “iron fist” against any Palestinian individual or group whose goal is to undermine the Palestinian leadership and “spread chaos and anarchy.”
Since the death of Banat, more than 70 Palestinians have been rounded up by PA security forces, according to Palestinian Lawyers for Justice.
In a related development, the PA warned its employees not to comment on social media networks or participate in peaceful assemblies denouncing the death of Banat.
The Coalition for Accountability and Integrity (AMAN), a Palestinian civil society organization that seeks to combat corruption, said it received complaints from Palestinian civil servants who were subjected to “administrative infractions which infringe on the right to freedom of opinion and expression.”
According to AMAN, various PA public institutions have issued verbal instructions, and a number of personnel were threatened with dismissal from their jobs.
In a letter to PA Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh, the group wrote that “the right of every Palestinian to freedom of opinion and expression should be respected.”
It said that civil society organizations are monitoring developments affecting public freedoms in the PA-ruled areas, “particularly following the assassination of political and social activist Nizar Banat.”
On Friday, the Fatah leadership decided to expel Jihad Hamayel, a leader of the faction’s Student Youth Movement at Bir Zeit University, north of Ramallah.
Hamayel was expelled after the student movement issued a statement denouncing the death of Banat and the PA crackdown on political activists. The movement also called on Shtayyeh to reveal the details of the attack on the activist and hold those responsible to account.