Ramallah / PNN /

The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA) condemns the arrest of freelance journalist JARRAH WALID KHALAF by the Palestinian Military Intelligence Service on Monday 4th of September.

The Palestinian Military Intelligence Service arrested journalist JARRAH WALID KHALAF (23 years old) from Jenin, after he was summoned for an interview at the Service headquarters in the city on Monday, corresponding to the 4th of September. The next day, he was brought before the Jenin Prosecution Office on charges of possession of weapons, and his detention was extended by the Public Prosecution for 48 hours to complete the investigation, provided that he remains detained in the Intelligence Service.

Based on what the journalist previously reported to MADA, he had been subjected to prosecution by the intelligence service starting on the 8th of August, when the journalist received a phone call from an officer in the Service asking him to go to the headquarters for an interview after he had been selected for a job in the Service, noting that the journalist had not applied for employment in the first place.

The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms "MADA", given the arrest of journalist JARRAH with extreme gravity by the Intelligence Service, which is not even authorized to summon or arrest him, calls for his immediate and unconditional release and calls for stopping the prosecution of journalists by the Palestinian security services on the grounds of their professional media work. It further calls for an end to all that after it has escalated significantly recently, and calls on official and human rights institutions to shoulder their responsibilities towards the political detention of journalists.