Palestinian sentenced to 20 years in jail on charge of resisting the occupation

[ 29/10/2009 - 11:18 AM ]

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- An Israeli court sentenced a Palestinian citizen from Gaza called Juma’h Azzam to 20 years in prison on charges of involvement in military acts against Israel and his affiliation with the Movement of Hamas and Al-Qassam Brigades. The court leveled several charges against Azzam including the firing of rockets from Gaza on Sderot settlement and planning to carry out attacks against Israeli targets and kidnap Israeli soldiers. The Israeli occupation forces kidnapped Azzam along with another citizen in 2006 as they were traveling from Gaza to the West Bank. In another context, the Palestinian ministry of prisoners’ affairs said that prisoner Abdelmoneim Tima, 41, joined on Wednesday the list of veteran prisoners who spent more than 20 years in Israeli jails, adding that the number of detainees in this list rose to 109 Palestinians. For his part, information director of the ministry Riyadh Al-Ashqar called on the armed wings of the Palestinian resistance factions to place the option of capturing Israeli occupation soldiers on the top of their agenda, stressing that the Israeli occupation understands only the language of force and would not release Palestinian captives except through this way. Ashqar hailed the positions of Al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, which pledged in recent statements to work hard on capturing more Israeli occupation soldiers to swap them for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. He said that such statements reflect Al-Qassam Brigades’ sense of responsibility towards its national issues especially the issue of prisoners in Israeli jails.