Ramallah, January 14: A magistrate’s court in Jerusalem on Wednesday sentenced Raed Salah, a leader of the Islamic Movement in Israel, to nine months in prison and six months’ probation for assaulting a police officer, a spokesman for his movement said.
“The court sentenced Sheikh Raed to nine months in prison and gave him a six-month suspended sentence for rioting and attacking a policeman,” Islamic Movement spokesman Zahi Njedat said.
Salah has until Feb. 28 to appeal the decision, his lawyer Khaled Zabarka said, adding that his client had not yet decided whether to do so.
Judge Yitzhak Shimoni said, “This is a significant verdict in order to clarify to the defendant the severity of the offense he committed.” The court also ordered Salah to pay 7,500 shekels ($2,000) to the officer.
The alleged assault took place during demonstrations that erupted in and around Jerusalem’s Old City in February 2007 when Israel embarked on excavations near Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
Demonstrators said the digging at Al-Magharebah Gate of Al-Aqsa threatened the foundations of the mosque, which is the third holiest site for Muslims.
In August 2007, Salah was indicted for “inciting racism and violence” for calling for a “third Intifada,” or uprising, to defend the mosque. He was detained in October during similar clashes at Al-Aqsa sparked by reports that Jewish extremists were attempting to pray inside the compound, which is closed to non-Muslim worshippers.
Israel has since banned him from the area, fearing further disturbances. Meanwhile, a Palestinian center in East Jerusalem revealed a plan by the Jewish-dominated Jerusalem municipality to confiscate 70 percent of lands belonging to Arab owners in the neighborhood of Silwan.
The Wadi Hilweh Information Center said in a press statement the Arabs own 548.5 dunams (about 55 hectares) in the Wadi Hilweh, to the south of Al-Aqsa Mosque, and 30 percent of the area is residential, public and religious buildings, roads and cemeteries.
The center added that the additional 70 percent of the area “will be placed under the jurisdiction of the municipality’s district committee and the nature and antiquities authorities.”
The center said the project is “part of Israeli efforts to Judaize Jerusalem and to displace its Arab inhabitants.”
——-Agencies