An Israeli court today ordered the remand of Arab-Israeli activist Sanaa Salameh until June 3. Salameh, the widow of deceased writer and activist Walid Daqqa, was arrested on Thursday and faces charges of “incitement and identifying with terrorist organizations,” according to her lawyer, Fadi Bransi.
Salameh’s late husband, Walid Daqqa, was a prominent writer and activist who died in Israeli prison last April after nearly 38 years of incarceration on charges related to the kidnapping and killing of an Israeli soldier. Israeli authorities have retained his remains since his death.
The arrest follows a formal request submitted on May 19 by Israeli Internal Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir to Interior Minister Moshe Arbel. Ben Gvir’s request called for Salameh’s deportation under a law permitting the expulsion of family members of individuals classified as “terrorists.” Ben Gvir stated that the attorney general had agreed to investigate Salameh based on social media posts accused of “incitement and identifying with terrorist organizations.” The specific social media content in question was not detailed.
Israeli police announced Salameh’s arrest in Jerusalem on Thursday, alleging she posted “statements considered to incite against the State of Israel and the soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces.”
Her lawyer, Fadi Bransi, asserted that the attorney general’s office “did not present any tangible evidence to support its accusations” against Salameh. Bransi characterized the proceedings against her as “political persecution,” stating that such actions are “not new” and that the entire family has faced persecution “since the first day that Walid Daqqa was arrested” in 1986. Bransi further added that Israeli authorities consider “any requests from Sanaa or other relatives to release his (Daqqa’s) body in order to bury him as identification with a terrorist act or terrorists.”
