The Palestine Center for Prisoner Studies has monitored the arrest of 100 citizens by the occupation authorities in 2020, due to their opinions and activities on social media pages, especially "Facebook".
Riyadh Al-Ashqar, Director of the Center, said that the occupation strikes against the wall all international covenants, agreements and treaties that allow people the freedom to express their opinion and beliefs in any way he deems appropriate, by continuing to arrest Palestinians for expressing opinion, accusing them of incitement and issuing prison sentences against them.
Al-Ashkar pointed out that the arrests for writing on social media affected women, children, journalists and activists, leaders of national action and representatives of the Legislative Council. While others were transferred to administrative detention without trial.
He pointed out that the occupation has set up a special electronic unit to follow up everything that Palestinian youths publish on "Facebook," which has classified some of the expressions that Palestinians usually use, such as posting words of martyrs´ obituaries, placing pictures of them or mentioning their niqabs and considering them as incitement, which requires arrest and trial.
He indicated that the military prosecution presents to the court the file of the prisoner accused of incitement, which includes dozens of papers that it has printed on his personal page, claiming that they are inflammatory statements and evidence of this person´s willingness to violate the security of the occupation and calls on the court to issue a harsh punishment against him because it poses a threat to the security of the occupation.
Al-Ashqar pointed out that the occupation not only issued actual and administrative rulings against citizens who were arrested for incitement on social media, but rather violated their rights by requiring them to stop using communication sites for periods of up to several months in addition to a financial fine or home imprisonment to prevent them from writing on these sites .
