Israeli forces have arrested a senior Palestinian official over his participation in a demonstration against the recent detention of the Palestinian Authority's Jerusalem al-Quds governor, Adnan Ghaith, and some other high-ranking officials from the Fatah movement. Eyewitnesses said
the secretary of the Fatah movement in Jerusalem al-Quds, Shadi Mutawar, outside a court where Ghaith had appeared before an Israeli judge on Thursday. The court extended Ghaith’s detention for five days on the pretext of giving the police more time to interrogate him. Ghaith and other Palestinian officials have been in detention for the second consecutive week. Israeli police detained Ghaith and some of his associates last week in a raid on his home in the Silwan neighborhood of Jerusalem al-Quds and took him into custody.This is the third time the Palestinian governor has been detained by Israeli forces this year.
Ghaith had briefly been arrested in April and May Palestinian officials have been arrested several times for obstructing the sale of Palestinian houses and property in the city to settler associations, according to Israeli officials.
More than 7,000 Palestinians are reportedly held in Israeli jails.
Hundreds of inmates have apparently been incarcerated under the practice of administrative detention, a policy under which Palestinians are kept in Israeli detention facilities without trial or charge.
Some Palestinian prisoners have been held in administrative detention for up to eleven years.
