Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Administrative detention is a sort of emergency way of detaining people without charge, without trial.
It's known in international law as a sort of emergency method where somebody is about to commit a terrorist attack. And in order to charge them, you may be giving away sort of intelligence secrets that you're not prepared to do, but it should not be a way of routinely arresting low key, low risk people. And Leanne, we don't know what it is that they think she's done. It was apparently under their catch all phrase, political activities, without specifying what they would be if she had done anything that really was noteworthy. Well, charge her.
[00:01:18] Speaker B: Well, welcome to the inside scoop. Jerusalem today to the backdrop of war, rumors of war, and serious threats of even more war. And there's a lot of other news going on over here in Israel. Take, for instance, the arrest of nine israeli soldiers on charges of abuse of palestinian prisoners, including suspected sodomy of one of the prisoners. The arrest sparked protests involving right wing Knesset members and pulled back the curtain on deep divisions within israeli society. In fact, one commentator called it the Kingdom of Israel versus the kingdom of Judah reincarnate. While Israelis are drawing attention to the plight of hostages being held in Gaza, pro palestinian groups are using this arrest to heighten awareness of the treatment that they receive in israeli jails, and not just during wartime. Complaints about the treatment of palestinian prisoners have long existed, and some organizations are solely dedicated to monitor this and to advocate for the prisoners.
This time, the detention facility in question is stated de Tayman, which has been called the Israeli Guantanamo. Around 4000 prisoners have been brought there from Gaza since the war began in October in response to a New York Times investigation about the site a few months ago, the Israeli Defense forces denied that systematic abuse had taken place there and even called some of the allegations completely unfounded. But late July, when israeli military police arrived at the facility to arrest the soldiers suspected, suspected of serious sexual abuse, they were met with resistance by some soldiers and later protesters, including far right Knesset members, who overran the facility.
The issue has divided the nation. The association for Civil Rights in Israel, AcRi and other groups have petitioned the high court to shut down Stehman due to these alleged human rights abuses against palestinian terror suspects.
Far right members of the governing coalition in Israel are asking why the country is even dealing with such a debate right now. Knesset member Simcha Rotman of the religious Zionism party and head of the law, constitution and justice committee asked the interviewer on con radio earlier this week, why at 07:00 a.m. do we have to deal with whether or not a Nukba terrorist was violated. While there are still 115 israeli hostages in Gaza, so is the fabric of that moral compass fraying? Is there a stronger call now after the October 7 atrocities for interrogations at all costs?
Long before the war, Israel had been detaining Palestinians under its policy of administrative detention, in which suspects are arrested and held without trial and without known charges, israeli authorities can renew administrative detentions indefinitely. According to Hamilcid, administrative detainees in Israel spend a year in detention on average. Israel says the controversial tactic and the secrecy surrounding it is necessary many times for security reasons. But Palestinians and right groups say the system denies due process and is widely abused.
So one of these cases that fall under, quote, national security is the arrest and extended detainment of Leon Nasser. Leanne, a 24 year old Christian, is not your usual suspect, and she is believed to be the only christian palestinian woman currently in israeli detention.
Her arrest in April and the extension of her detainment without explanation has galvanized the local anglican christian community and has raised awareness all the way up the ranks to the archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, who called her detainment an egregious state of affairs. It has also drawn attention to Israel's controversial arrest policy. According to a Sky News report, israeli officials said that Nasser was arrested in, quote, in view of intelligence information regarding the danger she poses to the security of the area, and that, quote, she resisted arrest and confronted the forces, end quote. Now, this is the second time that Leanne has been arrested.
In 2021, she was detained at her house for participating in student activities organized by a student group called the Progressive Democratic Students Poll.
[00:06:03] Speaker C: This is a group affiliated with the.
[00:06:05] Speaker B: Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Now, israeli authorities have banned this student group. They banned it in 2020, and they consider it actually a terrorist organization. I spoke with Reverend Richard Sewell, dean of St. George's College here in Jerusalem. He and his colleagues have been working with Leon's family to bring greater awareness of her detainment, which was recently extended. So let's get right to the interview.
[00:06:37] Speaker C: Well, thank you, Canon Richard Sewell, for being here today. I wanted to talk with you today about the case of Leon Nasser, who has been in israeli detention. I saw some Facebook posts, but honestly, I haven't been able to get much information about this. And then I saw, I saw a post of yours, so I wanted to reach out to you. And apparently you have been involved in this for, and the church has been involved in this case. So I'd like to back up and just tell us a little bit about who she is and what happened.
[00:07:17] Speaker A: Okay, so Leanne is a 24 year old palestinian christian girl. She lives in Birzeit, just outside Ramallah in the occupied West bank. She.
She and her family are members of our church, St. Peter's in Birzeit. It's fairly old in anglican terms, not old in Holy Land terms, church. And when she was at Birzeit University two years ago, in her final year, she was taken, arrested by israeli security forces, and they put her into administrative detention, and they held her there for three months. Administrative detention is a sort of emergency way of detaining people without charge, without trial.
It's known in international law as a sort of emergency method where somebody is about to commit a terrorist attack. And in order to charge them, you may be giving away sort of intelligence secrets that you're not prepared to do, but it should not be a way of routinely arresting low key, low risk people. And Leanne, we don't know what it is that they think she's done. It was apparently under the catch all phrase, political activities without specifying what they would be. Leanne is not a known political activist. She's never been a part of a political party, but active in pastoral care in the university. Pastoral care often means helping people when they are in trouble with the security forces, which can routinely happen so easily.
It's very much part of day to day life for Palestinians.
And so she was held in an israeli jail for three months, released in May 2022, and after that, she completed her studies. She graduated as a nutritionist.
I was at her wonderful graduation party in Ramallah those two years ago. And then between then and April this year, nothing happened at all until, in the middle of the night, Leanne's family heard the noise of heavy traffic outside, suddenly beating on the door, and about 15 heavily armed security forces, israeli security forces rushed into the house, held the entire family at gunpoint, told Leanne she had to get dressed quickly.
She did. They bound her hand and foot. They gagged her, threw her into the back of a security vehicle, and took her off to a place of detention.
And then a week or so later, the family did not know where she was taken, why she was taken, or what they could do about it. They were just completely in the dark. And a week later, her lawyer was informed that she would be taken to an israeli jail. So that in itself is a war crime to remove somebody from their place of residence into foreign territory.
By taking her into Israel, it means that her family are not permitted to visit her.
[00:11:16] Speaker C: Where was she held before that?
[00:11:18] Speaker A: In Dumon prison, just outside Haifa.
[00:11:22] Speaker C: But that.
Is that in Israel? Because you said she was taken into a different territory.
[00:11:28] Speaker A: Yeah. So out of the West bank and into Israel. And her parents have no permission to come out of the West bank. They're not able to get permits to come out of the West bank.
But anyway, since the war started, Israel has withdrawn all rights of family visits.
They're doing that as a way of punishing all Palestinians because of the hostages in Gaza who do not have a right to family visit. So they have simply said, we will put the same conditions on everybody taken prisoner, um, in. In Israel, every Palestinian that is not. Not Israelis, obviously. Um, so that's where she has been for the last four months. Um, she has had one hearing in the military court, um, where the family were able to say why they feel it's unjust. They did not hear the Israel, uh, military case. As to why she should be kept, the judge knows, but the family and her lawyer do not know. And we have just hired.
[00:12:34] Speaker C: Her lawyer doesn't know.
[00:12:36] Speaker A: Her lawyer does not get to see the charges against her? No, that is not permitted. That's part of.
[00:12:41] Speaker C: I can't imagine a lawyer would be useful if they didn't know the charges.
[00:12:46] Speaker A: No. Well, you're working in and around the rules, such as they are, for administrative detention, about conditions that she's kept in, about the length of time she's kept in, why they feel administrative detention is unjust. So it's in a very tight, I see, corner of legislation, but you at least have to try to work within that to find some way of getting her released. But we just heard yesterday that her four month detention has been extended for a further four months.
And the family are absolutely devastated.
The church, our church, all of us are devastated for the extension of her time of detention, and we're powerless to do anything about it. I mean, we are operating an international advocacy campaign around Leanne. Her name is well known around the world, especially amongst the christian community.
And of course, it must be said that there are more than three and a half thousand Palestinians in administrative detention about. I think the figure at the moment is 35 of those under 18 years of age.
So children and every case has its own particular injustices and particularities.
And I personally do not see the justification for administrative detention in any sort of low level cases.
But it's a way of avoiding proper due legal procedures that you would expect in a court of law. And so you can be kept in this way without having to make a proper legal case. So that's the situation that we're currently in.
She's in prison in Israel. We're very worried about her safety and welfare because of the conditions of palestinian prisons. Across all israeli prisons at present, there have been a lot of cases and a lot of exposure of horrendous mistreatment of palestinian prisoners, whether they've come out of Gaza. And that is especially bad. I mean, criminally bad.
But routinely, palestinian prisoners are being underfed, being over too many people in one prison cell, lack of exercise, all these sorts of things that you would expect in a civilized prison. And these things are being withdrawn routinely. We don't know many of the precise details of Leanne's case. Her lawyer is not permitted to visit her because she also is a palestinian without permission. But a colleague of hers, israeli colleague, has been able to visit her in prison, that she is safe and she is okay.
That's really. We don't know much more than that.
[00:16:14] Speaker C: Okay.
There's a lot I want to ask you, but one of the things you said, there are 3500 prisoners, palestinian prisoners, right now in administrative detention. The reason, you know, you've said this to me before as well, like there, there's. You can only focus on one and try to get to the bottom of this case sometimes. And the reason I'm focusing on Leon is because she's a Christian. And to your knowledge, have you, do you know of any other christians that have been in this situation?
[00:16:53] Speaker A: I don't know any that are currently in israeli prisons. No. I'm under administrative detention. No, I don't know.
[00:17:01] Speaker C: Right. This is a very, very rare case. It's not something that I've heard of in my years covering the news here. And so it really caught my attention that there was a Christian who was arrested. So, of course, we want to know. Well, why and what would be the justification? Tell us about Leon and her family and probably within the context of also the christian community.
[00:17:34] Speaker A: Yeah. So they're a longstanding anglican family.
The anglican church has been there in Birzeit for 200 years, 150 years.
And the family had been members of that church for several generations. Her mother is a wonderful, gentle, deeply faithful christian woman.
In her forties.
She, Lulu, and her husband, Sammy. Sammy works at Birzeit University in administration.
And they're very gentle, dedicated people. They've got three children. So the, the eldest is training as a doctor, actually, has just gone to America to do further training in. In Atlanta or. No, in North Carolina, I think. She has a twin brother, Basil.
And he is still. He is still at home with. With his. With his parents. And, you know, they're just a very ordinary palestinian christian family. Nothing remarkable about them, except they're strong and they're steadfast and they're determined.
And Leanne herself from. I have met her, but I don't know her well, but when I've visited the family since she has been in detention, I always ask them, you know, tell me about Leanne, and what do you. They say she's a really strong person.
She's really determined and courageous, but she's got a very gentle heart.
She's always looking out for vulnerable people who need support and care and love and attention. And she is the one who will stand up and do the thing that maybe others haven't got around to doing.
She's a deeply loving, caring person, but also a strong person. Her brother Basil said they would always fight and she would always win. A and so, you know, she's got. She's got real inner strength, and that is what will get her through her time in detention, that she. She is. She is no wallflower, and she's going to be determined to see it through with courage.
[00:20:06] Speaker C: Now, I'm assuming the family doesn't have israeli citizenship, and perhaps they don't also have israeli id.
[00:20:15] Speaker A: They do not.
[00:20:16] Speaker C: Okay. They don't. So that. Because I think maybe a lot of people outside don't understand that despite the fact that even Bethlehem is, by the way, like, 2 miles from where I'm sitting, that it's actually like crossing some kind of border and you need permission or a documentation. And so Palestinians in Brazil who don't have israeli id and don't would need permits to get into Israel, into Jerusalem, and then to get to Haifa to see her in prison. So when they arrested her or when they took her originally, was she held first in the West bank and then brought to the prison?
[00:20:59] Speaker A: She was held for several nights in the West Bank.
I mean, maybe offer military prison before she was transferred out and into Israel itself.
[00:21:13] Speaker C: Okay. Okay. So I just wanted to provide a little context about understanding. It's not.
Even though everything is close, it's not necessarily reachable.
So. Okay, now, the Christians are a minority both in Israel and in the palestinian territories. Christians are, I think, 2% of israeli and 1% or so of Palestinians. And I would guess that Anglicans are an extreme minority of the minority.
[00:21:53] Speaker A: We are.
[00:21:54] Speaker C: Can you number the number? How many Anglicans are there?
[00:21:58] Speaker A: Well, in the West bank, we have got five churches, two in Nablus two in Ramallah. Well, Ramallah and Birzeit. And then one Zubabdi up in the north of the West bank. You know, they're small churches, maybe with, you know, 50 families each.
Not even that, maybe 30 families each. So we're in the hundreds in the West bank.
In Israel, we've got a few more churches and we're, you know, a couple of thousand in Jordan we've got a few more. That's part of our diocese. And there are more, more Christians, Anglicans in Jordan than there are in Israel Palestine put together.
But still in total, where, you know, maybe 8000, 9000 people, we're tiny.
[00:22:55] Speaker C: That's very tiny. That's very, that's actually competing with the Armenians for the minority of minorities.
[00:23:02] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:23:04] Speaker C: What about in Gaza?
[00:23:06] Speaker A: In Gaza we don't have any Anglicans at all. But, but our, but our ministry in Gaza is the al Ahli hospital, which people will know about because it's such an important hospital.
It's just about the only fully operative hospital in the north of Gaza. It's in Gaza City.
And, and so our, our vested interest in there is through that very important ministry.
[00:23:35] Speaker C: Okay, can you tell us a little bit from your perspective, what is it like for Christians both under israeli authorities and palestinian authorities? What are the freedoms? What are the inhibitions? Is it the same? Is it different?
[00:23:55] Speaker A: Well, you know, Palestinians in Israel are.
If they're, if they're citizens, you know, so if they're, if they're east Jerusalemites, then they've got not full citizenship. They're third class citizens. If they're israeli citizens, then they're second class citizens because they do not have the same rights as israeli jewish israeli citizens.
There's discrimination are both institutional and attitudinal, and yet there are freedoms that are appreciated under a theoretical democracy. I think that's becoming increasingly a dubious term in Israel, the way that things are going under the present government.
But they, you know, they enjoy certain rights and freedom, which are valuable and, you know, nobody would want to dismiss that. But nevertheless, you can't get away from the fact that as a Palestinian, whether you're Muslim or Christian, whether you're an Anglican or Catholic or whatever denomination, you do not have full citizens rights in terms of travel, in terms of return, in terms of family reunification, in terms of where you can live and what you can do and the education, many, many aspects.
[00:25:20] Speaker C: But not because they're christian, though. It's. Right.
[00:25:24] Speaker A: Okay, so just, there are no specific institutionalized discriminations against Christians, but there are as Palestinians?
[00:25:36] Speaker C: Yeah. It's more to do with the ethnicity than the religion.
[00:25:40] Speaker A: It is, yeah, it is.
[00:25:41] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:25:43] Speaker A: In the West bank, obviously, it's a majority muslim culture context. But of course, although the West bank is theoretically run by the Palestinian Authority, everybody knows it's run by Israel because they control who goes in, who comes out, where. You can live within the West bank, and it is a profoundly oppressed society because of the occupation of Israel.
Then if you strip away that, what is life like for Christians in Palestine? Well, in reality, there are discriminations.
Christians do not always feel free to be able to get the jobs that they want. There may be discrimination from certain muslim parts of the community, and they don't feel their culture is always honoured and respected. And maybe they don't feel their rights are always protected. Theoretically, they are. There is nothing institutional under the Palestinian Authority that discriminates against Christians. But attitudinally, then, yes, people do feel they are not always respected. But on the other hand, there are many alliances, many friendships, many family bonds that bind Palestinians of all communities together. And against a common, you might say enemy, or you might say challenge of the israeli occupation.
And there is common cause in many, many ways. And so I think many christian Palestinians would not describe their whole life as oppressed by the wider society at all. But it would be wrong to say there isn't anything at all.
So a broad brush stroke. You could go all sorts of details, but that's, that's the broad context.
[00:27:55] Speaker C: Okay, so, and in the context of this, I think, like we said before, it's so rare for a christian, you know, often to just tell people that it's, it's a political issue more than a religious issue here of, between Israelis and Palestinians. And so, but nevertheless, you don't usually see christians involved in attacks and then in arrests. It's very, very rare. And of course, a 23 year old girl, I think she was 23 when she was arrested. Maybe you said she's 24. Maybe she is.
[00:28:35] Speaker A: Now.
[00:28:37] Speaker C: That's not your stereotypical, maybe national.
It's not your typical suspect in the world of possible terrorism or a security threat.
Usually the security threats are, you know, they'll, they'll limit men between the ages of, like, you know, 25 to 40 or something like that. But she doesn't fit the stereotype, nor not by religion and not by, by age or gender or anything. So what is, you know, like, it seems that Israel would not arrest somebody without cause. I mean, it seems unreasonable they would go to that length to find somebody who fits none of the stereotypes and have no cause to arrest and then to extend the detention. Sorry, not arrest the detention.
[00:29:42] Speaker A: Unfortunately, Israel does detain and imprison people for no good reason.
There are multiple examples of that. But what might have drawn her to the attention of the security forces and that nobody really knows except that, you know, I think her pastoral care and her sense of the injustice that her student colleagues were experiencing made her, I think, a sort of spokesperson. She was, she would speak up for those who did not feel able to speak for themselves, and she would.
[00:30:33] Speaker C: In what context were they unable to speak for themselves? What was.
[00:30:37] Speaker A: But I don't know the specifics. But in terms of, at Birzeit University, you know, many might get stopped, detained at checkpoints on the way to the university.
They might be barred or they might, you know, have charges brought against them. And I think she would just be alongside them and would support them.
And she's very articulate. She's very, you know, she stands out. She's, she's a striking looking person, and she's an articulate and intelligent person. And maybe by vocalizing the grievances of people, she stood out as a potential community leader or spokeswoman. And so take it. Pick. Pick her up as a warning. You know, don't even think about agitating or highlighting the injustices that people are experiencing. And this, I gather, happens quite routinely that people who are potential community leaders are incarcerated as a way of silencing them and a way of intimidating them and ensuring that they don't cause any problem, any further problems to the occupying powers. And if she had done anything that really was noteworthy, well, charge her.
You know, they've now had plenty of time to charge her. So tell us what it is that is supposedly so subversive and so dangerous that she should need to be incarcerated and have done with it. You know, then there can be no disagreement, can there, that there is just no justification for administrative detention in cases like this.
You know, if you found a weapon on her and you thought she was about to commit a crime, fair enough. And it takes time to gather information, but there is no suggestion that she was involved in any violence. If she was involved in political activity. Well, let's hear it.
[00:32:53] Speaker C: Yeah. And you said, what about her social media presence? I know, you know, that we're in the midst of a war, and there has, there's been repercussions. There have been repercussions of people who post things on social media. And there is, of course, the charge of genocide. You know, that it is Israel committing genocide in Gaza. And has she posted anything like that? Has she taken a very strong stance on social media?
[00:33:24] Speaker A: No, she has not.
[00:33:25] Speaker C: No. Okay.
[00:33:27] Speaker A: As you know, so many Palestinians at the beginning of the war, after the initial, you know, once they saw how the Israelis were acting, they just deleted their social media apps. And really, you know, post very, very little. And Leanne was, to my understanding, inactive on the social media front.
[00:33:49] Speaker C: Okay. All right. Well, it's also interesting in light of protests this week that are going on at some of these centers where Palestinians are being held and where soldiers have been accused of some heinous acts of abuse of the prisoners. And it's basically, it's drawing Israel itself into some kind of civil war about what's happening. So she seems to be caught up in the midst of this turmoil as well.
[00:34:22] Speaker A: Well, I truly, truly hope there is nothing of that nature going on in the prison where she is held. I think the places where that particular incident took place were where gazan detainees were being held. And we know they are experiencing the very worst. I mean, there are very well documented cases of torture of Gazans.
There have been a number of deaths and amputations of Gazans.
The precise circumstances of all of these have not come to trial, but they're well documented by israeli human rights organizations.
The conditions in mainstream israeli prisons, I don't think, are quite as bad as that. But we do know that all palestinian prisoners have had the usual conditions harshened, tightened very significantly.
And, you know, the family, all of us, are really worried about what she is experiencing in jail. And when her priest has requested to visit her, that is a right under israeli law, that religious carers should be able to visit prisoners inside. That permission has not yet been granted. Now, four months into her incarceration. So why would you deny that to somebody? I don't know.
We're very concerned. When you deny these rights, it creates justifiably suspicion about what is going on and what is being hidden. And so we are calling upon the israeli prison authorities to grant those rights which should be theirs under law, so that we can be reassured that Leyan is not suffering abuse and the denial of essential rights for welfare and well being.
[00:36:27] Speaker C: Yeah. Okay. Well, what are you calling. What are you, as a church, doing about this issue?
[00:36:37] Speaker A: Well, we are.
We're advocating internationally through all the channels that are available to us. Today. The archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has tweeted his support for Leanne. He has taken an ongoing interest in her case and has repeated, you know, very much what I've been saying that her administrative detention is unjust and unjustifiable.
There are american senators and the Episcopal Church in the United States have been agitating for her release. We want her released. We think she should be released. And in the absence of any accusations against her that justify her detention, she should be released.
And that is the bottom line.
And while she is being detained, we're asking for her to receive the visits from lawyers and from her priest to reassure the family that she is in good health and mental wellbeing.
But I think the international community, such as they are aware of what's going on. And, of course, this is not the biggest concern. The biggest concern is what's happening in Gaza and then the general conditions of the West bank and then so many other things.
So these details, which seem relatively minor, but which to the family and to her community is not minor. It's hard to get them up the, up the political scale that they get the attention that they deserve. But every life is important and every case is important, and every person deserves to have their situation properly treated. And so we're trying to make sure it is higher up on the political agenda.
But maybe the Israelis don't like all that exposure of what's going on, punishing the family by keeping her in longer.
[00:38:47] Speaker C: Well, let's, let's hope there is resolution and soon. And I, you know, I think it's important to bring, bring attention. Like you said, that's, it's this maybe the smallest issue, but just like that, christians are always, you know, the smallest issue here in this land. And, and so to hear about her case and to know her name and to try to get more understanding of what's happening, I think is very important. So thank you so much for sharing. Thank you for taking time out to tell the story.
[00:39:23] Speaker A: Well, please, I ask everybody, if you're the praying kind, please pray for Leanne, for her welfare and for her release and for her family. And if you have got ways of advocating for her by, you know, approaching political representatives, please, if everybody could do that, you know, we need everybody who can to do what they can.
[00:39:46] Speaker C: Yeah, whatever you have, I can put links in the notes here and in the description, and so people will be able to get more information or to reach out in some way. So for sure, I'll share that.
[00:40:02] Speaker A: Thank you, Nicole. I really appreciate you taking the time to hear Leanne's case.
[00:40:06] Speaker C: Yeah, for sure. Thank you.
[00:40:23] Speaker B: Thank you so much for tuning in today. I really believe it's so important to understand the complexities here in the Middle east and all the different people groups, especially as the times get way more complicated. So if you want more inside scoops like this from Jerusalem, please subscribe to this channel. Please give us a like and share with your friends.
Thank you so much for tuning in. And as always, this is the inside scoop. Jerusalem.
