Israel rejects Ahed Tamimi’s request for early release

A parole board in the Rimonim prison rejected a request filed by detained Palestinian teen Ahed Tamimi’s lawyer to reduce her sentence and grant her early release.

Israel’s Channel 10 reported that Tamimi, who was sentenced in March to eight months in prison, filed a request to be released before serving the last third of the sentence, but a parole board rejected the request.

The channel added that the Israeli public security service, Shin Bet, had recommended earlier that Tamimi not be released early under the pretext that she  has “dangerous ideology” and she should remain in prison for deterrence purposes.

During her parole session, Tamimi stressed: “I will get out of prison with my head up,” the channel reported.

Ahed Tamimi was arrested on 19 December 2017, after her mother Nariman posted footage online of the teenager confronting Israeli soldiers in the family’s backyard.

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The teen was convicted on four of the 12 charges against her including incitement, aggravated assault and two counts of obstructing Israeli soldiers. She was handed an eight-month prison term following a plea bargain.

Her mother Nariman was sentenced to eight months in prison in addition to a fine of 6,000 shekels ($1,724) and a three-year suspended sentence for assisting in assaulting a soldier, obstructing a soldier and incitement. Ahed’s cousin, Noor, was fined 2,000 shekels ($575).

Earlier this week, Ahed’s cousin, 21-year-old Izz Al-Din Tamimi, was shot dead by Israeli soldiers in the occupied West Bank village of Nabi Saleh. Activists said that Israeli occupation forces prevented Palestinian medical teams from reaching the youth to help him before he was taken away by the soldiers, according to WAFA.