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http://www.dallasnews.com/nation/stories/050702dnnatdetain.2ebc.html
Israel arrests 2 Americans with past ties to area group Supporters
say they are worried about torture and isolation
05/07/2002
By MICHELLE
MITTELSTADT / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON
– Two Americans associated with a Dallas-area relief organization
recently established to help Palestinian children were arrested
in Israel over the weekend, supporters said Monday.
KinderUSA's
executive director and the president of the board of directors
were separately detained in Jerusalem on Sunday, the Council on
American-Islamic Relations and others said.
Beyond their
affiliation with Irving-based KinderUSA, Dalell Mohmed and Dr.
Riad Abdelkarim share another tie: past association with the Holy
Land Foundation for Relief and Development. The Richardson-based
foundation, accused of being a front for the anti-Israel terrorist
organization Hamas, was shut down in December after President
Bush ordered its assets frozen. Foundation officials, who staunchly
deny funding terrorism, are suing to lift the freeze.
The Council
on American-Islamic Relations and an Israeli attorney representing
Ms. Mohmed said they were unable to say whether the Holy Land
ties played any role in the detention of the 47-year-old Dallas
woman or Dr. Abdelkarim, a Los Angeles-area physician who toured
the West Bank city of Jenin for International Medical Corps, a
relief organization.
"Our primary
concern at this early stage is that they both face torture. The
Israelis have a long and well-documented history of torture and
abuse," said Ibrahim Hooper, a council spokesman.
The Israeli
Embassy, preparing for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's White House
visit Tuesday, referred calls to the Israeli Consulate in Houston.
Officials there didn't return calls seeking comment, nor did the
State Department.
Dr. Abdelkarim,
whose account of the devastation caused by the Israeli occupation
of Jenin has circulated on the Internet, was detained at the airport
while trying to return to the United States, said Nidal Ibrahim,
a family friend. Ms. Mohmed, who had arrived in Jerusalem last
week and had not made her way to the West Bank, was arrested in
her hotel room, human-rights lawyer Lea Tsemel said in Jerusalem.
Ms. Tsemel
said she was appealing an Israeli decision barring her from seeing
her client, who, like Dr. Abdelkarim, is being held at a prison
outside Tel Aviv. While saying she was unaware of the specific
reason for the arrest, Ms. Tsemel said, "It's something to do
with an illegal organization, but it's not very clear."
Israel declared
the Holy Land Foundation an illegal organization several years
ago. But supporters said Dr. Abdelkarim and Ms. Mohmed had traveled,
without problem, to Israel and Palestinian territories on a number
of occasions, the physician most recently in January after the
Holy Land Foundation was shut down.
"That's one
of the most distressing aspects of all of this," said Mr. Ibrahim,
adding that the physician had been denied access to his attorney.
"There has been no communication in regard to any reason for this."
In a prepared
statement, Dr. Abdelkarim's family called on the State Department
to ensure his safety and secure his release. "Our greatest fear,
right now, is for Riad's safety given Israel's acknowledged policy
of using 'physical pressure' in questioning suspects – including
American citizens," the statement said, noting that the physician
is American "born and bred."
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