Saudi Arabia launches new campaign of arrests against Palestinian expats

Saudi Arabia has launched a new campaign of arbitrary arrests against several Palestinian expatriates living in the kingdom for supporting the Islamic resistance movement, Hamas.

The Prisoners of Conscience Twitter account which monitors the conditions of prisoners in Saudi Arabia said it has received “confirmed information” that the Saudi authorities have launched a new campaign of arbitrary arrests against Palestinian ex-pats. It adds that a number of the Palestinians targeted in the new campaign are relatives or sons of Palestinians who had been arrested during the first campaign in April, last year for the same reason.

In April, last year the Saudi authorities launched a campaign of arrests against Palestinian ex-pats including a senior leader in Hamas movement, Muhammad al-Khodari, 81, and his eldest son Hani.

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The Twitter account defended the Palestinian detainees saying that supporting the (Palestinian) resistance is not a crime that requires arrests and demanded the Saudi authorities “to immediately release all detainees from the last campaign, and stop the trials of those detained last year which will begin early next month”.

Earlier this month, the Twitter account said the Saudi prosecution accuses the Palestinian detainees of illegally transferring funds (to the Palestinian resistance factions) and establishing unlicensed organisations to defend Palestinian and Jordanian detainees in the kingdom.

The Palestinian detainees will be tried before the Saudi Specialized Criminal Court on March 8.

On September 6, 2019, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said that Saudi Arabia is forcibly hiding 60 Palestinians.