On the eighth anniversary of the sentencing of Ahmad Sa’adat in Zionist military courts, the Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat urges a broad popular, political and media campaign to free Ahmad Sa’adat and all Palestinian prisoners on January 13-15, 2017. These dates mark the 15th anniversary of Ahmad Sa’adat’s abduction by the Palestinian Authority at the behest of Israel, the United States and their allies.
On December 25, 2008, one day before the launch of the brutal attack on the Gaza Strip by Zionist occupation forces, Ahmad Sa’adat, the imprisoned General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was sentenced to 30 years in prison by a Zionist military court. The sentencing came nearly two years after the attack on Jericho prison and the seizure of Sa’adat and his comrades.
Sa’adat spoke at the military court: “In defense of the justice of our cause and in defense of the legitimate struggle of our people against the occupation, I refuse to recognize the legitimacy of your court or to legitimize your occupation or to stand before either of these. Because what you call a list of accusations and ‘security infractions’ are in reality my patriotic duties…and would have to be framed within the context of the general duty of resistance against occupation. At the same time, and as the General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, I would like to reaffirm my pride in belonging to the Palestinian Revolutionary Movement and to the extensions of this movement in the regional, national and international planes that form the components of the international movement against the imperialist system ”
Eight years later, we urge all supporters of justice in Palestine, Palestinian organizations and communities and international movements of solidarity, BDS organizations and prison justice campaigns to join us in days of action from January 13-15, 2017 to highlight the struggle of over 7,000 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
On this occasion we also highlight the policy of Palestinian Authority security coordination with Israel and its responsibility and complicity in the ongoing imprisonment of Ahmad Sa’adat, as well as the responsibility of the United States and the United Kingdom in Sa’adat’s imprisonment and the attack on Jericho prison.
On January 13, 14, and 15, 2017, the Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat calls for:
1) A broad campaign of events, protests and actions in support of the freedom of Ahmad Sa’adat and all Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails. Protest at Israeli, US and UK institutions, gather in public squares, and organize educational events and actions about the Palestinian prisoners’ cause.
2) Building the campaign for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel and against complicit corporations, including Hewlett-Packard. We echo Sa’adat’s call for “all forms of boycott: political, economic, academic and cultural of the occupation state and the creation of a real economic cost for its industries of colonization and settlement..escalating the global campaigns for boycott of all corporations that support and invest in the occupation militarily and economically.”
3) Demanding an end to Palestinian Authority security coordination with the Israeli occupation and an end to PA political arrests that serve the interests of the occupation.
Freedom for Ahmad Sa’adat and all Palestinian prisoners!
Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat
December 25, 2016
Additional information and further calls, in conjunction with Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network and other organizations, will be forthcoming.
