Prison affairs minister: Alliot-Marie's visit to Shalit's family proves bias

[ 23/01/2011 - 10:50 AM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- Gaza minister of prisoner affairs Mohammed Faraj al-Ghaul said visits by French Foreign Minister Michele Alliot-Marie to Shalit's family proved her bias to Israel. "I expected the minister to visit the relatives of seven thousand captives in Israeli jails, but her exclusive visit to Shalit's home is clear evidence of her solidarity with Israel," Ghaul said at a sit in staged Saturday by the Islamic Jihad Movement to show solidarity with Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. He also said that Shalit was captured in the battlefield and was part of an army committing daily war crimes against the people in Gaza while Palestinian captives in occupation jails are kidnapped from their homes and the midst of their families, which is a real war crime. Shalit, a dual citizen of France and Israel, was captured by Gaza resistance forces in 2006. Alliot-Marie got a hostile reception from Palestinians upon her arrival to Gaza on Friday. Media outlets had misquoted the FM as saying Hamas's five-year capture of Shalit is a war crime after a visit she made to Shalit's family. She did say that he should be allowed visits from the Red Cross. Israel is sole beneficiary Speaking at the sit in, senior Islamic Jihad official Nafidh Ezam condemned the PA's torture of resistance movement leader Khadir Adnan. "Why do you arrest and persecute the symbol of resistance in the West Bank Khadir Adnan?" he said. "What goes on in the West Bank does not serve our people and our resistance against the occupation. The sole beneficiary of these assaults is Israel, which is trying to eat and steal."