Frankly Speaking: What hope is there for Gaza’s children?

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Updated 01 April 2024
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Frankly Speaking: What hope is there for Gaza’s children?

Frankly Speaking: What hope is there for Gaza’s children?
  • UNICEF spokesperson says averting famine in Gaza hinges on immediate ceasefire, unrestricted aid access
  • Says Gaza is “potentially the most dangerous place in the world” for aid workers and recipients

DUBAI: Is there any hope for the children of Gaza amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict, restrictions on aid access, and a looming famine in the north of the enclave?

According to UN Children’s Fund spokesperson James Elder, who recently toured the length of Gaza, only an immediate ceasefire can turn the humanitarian situation around.

Appearing on the Arab News current affairs show “Frankly Speaking” via video link from Rafah, on the Gaza-Egypt border, Elder said that opening multiple entry points and delivering sufficient aid could help save the most vulnerable, including the one in three children under the age of two in the north of Gaza who are suffering from acute malnutrition.




Speaking to “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen from Rafah, James Elder lauded the irreplaceable role played in the humanitarian response by UNRWA and highlighted Israel’s unmet obligations under international law to allow sufficient aid to enter Gaza. (AN photo)

“The ability to scale out, to get aid across an area, is what UNICEF does,” Elder told “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen.

“We have the world’s largest humanitarian supply hub in Denmark. We airlift, we ship, we do everything. We have warehouses here in the region as well. So, multiple warehouses … consistently ready to bring in that aid.”

However, until Israel lifts its restrictions on how much aid is permitted to enter the embattled enclave, enabling UNICEF and other humanitarian agencies to deliver much-needed relief, many fear the extreme food insecurity already endured by Palestinians will escalate into a full-blown famine.

In the wide-ranging interview, Elder described the irreplaceable role played in the humanitarian response by the cash-strapped UN Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA, and highlighted Israel’s unmet obligations under international law to allow sufficient aid to enter Gaza.




Speaking to “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen from Rafah, James Elder lauded the irreplaceable role played in the humanitarian response by UNRWA and highlighted Israel’s unmet obligations under international law to allow sufficient aid to enter Gaza. (AN photo)

Elder also spoke about the “annihilation” of Gazan cities and the threats posed to UN workers and aid recipients amid the fighting, which had made the Palestinian territory “potentially the most dangerous place on the planet.”

A UN-backed report released in March warned that unless the hostilities are halted and unrestricted aid is allowed to flow into the Gaza Strip, famine could occur by the end of May. The report said 70 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million-strong population is experiencing catastrophic levels of hunger and food insecurity.

The International Court of Justice at The Hague warned on Thursday that “famine is setting in” as a result of Israel’s continued restrictions on the flow of aid.

In a unanimous ruling, the UN’s highest court ordered Israel to take “all the necessary and effective action” to ensure basic food supplies reach the Palestinian people without delay.

And while saving people in Gaza from starvation is achievable, it will take longer to address “things like disease, the devastation to the health system, to hospitals, to water systems, to sewerage,” said Elder.

Since Israel launched its Gaza operation in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack of October 7, the enclave has become a graveyard for at least 13,000 children, according to UN figures.

Acute malnutrition now affects 31 percent of children under the age of two in the northern governorates, while at least 23 children have already died of starvation and dehydration.

Creating these conditions could amount to a war crime, the UN human rights chief, Volker Turk, told the BBC on Thursday, adding that there was a “plausible” case that Israel was using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza.

“International humanitarian law is very clear on proportionalities and on what warring factions can do,” said Elder. “We have seen so many breaches in this war, and for children it seems to make no difference right now. Children don’t understand whether international law is being abided by or not.

“Right now, all they are doing is facing the severity of something that no child ever, ever should have to endure.”

In the initial months of the conflict, the bulk of aid distribution and relief work was carried out by UNRWA, which has supported Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon since 1949.




UN workers prepare humanitarian food aid at a UNRWA warehouse/distribution center in Rafah for distribution to Palestinian refugees amid continuing battles between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. The warehouse was partially hit by an Israeli strike on March 13, 2024. (AFP)

However, in January, more than a dozen countries suspended funding for UNRWA after Israel claimed that 12 of the UN agency’s staff had participated in the October 7 attack, while 450 others were “military operatives in terror groups.”

Although an internal investigation and a separate independent investigation have been launched to examine the allegations, the bulk of UNRWA’s funding is still yet to be restored, bringing its operations in Gaza to the brink of collapse.

Elder said UNICEF and other aid agencies are in no position to assume UNRWA’s responsibilities if it goes under.

“UNRWA is the backbone of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip,” he said. “UNRWA has got thousands and thousands of very brave workers, of teachers, of doctors, of pharmacists, of nurses, of you name it.

“UNICEF has deep specialties in child protection and nutrition and so forth, but in terms of that full manpower across the Gaza Strip, the people of Gaza need UNRWA.”

He added: “Fifty percent of food aid getting to those civilians in the north was delivered by UNRWA. That has now been blocked. That’s fast-tracking catastrophe.”




Israeli demonstrators gather by the border fence with Egypt at the Nitzana border crossing in southern Israel on February 18, 2024, as they attempt to block humanitarian aid trucks from entering into Israel on their way to the Gaza Strip. (AFP)

Gaza has become an extremely dangerous place for aid agencies to operate.

“People have been killed receiving aid, aid workers — more aid workers, more of my United Nations colleagues killed in this war than in any time since the advent of the United Nations. This is the reality that people are dealing with,” said Elder.

“Now the UN does work in very dangerous places. That’s what we do. Afghanistan, Sudan, Ukraine, here in Gaza. But we need to be very clear. International humanitarian law is unequivocal. Israel has a legal obligation to facilitate aid, not just getting in, but then to ensure it is safely distributed to those most in need.”

During his journey along the length of the Gaza Strip, Elder was appalled by the scale of the humanitarian catastrophe. While traveling through the Rafah border crossing from Egypt, he saw “hundreds of trucks blocked there with life-saving aid on the wrong side of the border.”

“We are not getting nearly enough aid in,” he added.

Later, during his visit to northern Gaza, he saw “people hanging on to life, children and families who urgently need food.” And yet, “there are crossings there that could be opened, old crossings where you would have aid within 10 or 15 minutes.”

With road access into Gaza limited by Israeli forces, aid agencies have been examining options for a maritime corridor. In mid-March, the Open Arms set sail from Cyprus towing 200 tonnes of flour, protein, and rice bound for Gaza.




The Open Arms, a rescue vessel owned by a Spanish NGO, departs with humanitarian aid for Gaza from Larnaca, Cyprus, on March 30, 2024. (REUTERS)

“Any aid is useful aid, but the ship had the equivalent of around 12 trucks,” said Elder. “There’s 50 times 12 trucks on the other side of the border.”

Another aid access workaround pursued by the US, Jordan and Egypt is airdrops, parachuting aid into Gaza.

However, airdrops are usually used “when people are massively cut off from humanitarian assistance — a flood or a natural disaster,” said Elder. “Here, they’re not cut off. There’s a road network. Road is the efficient, effective way. Roads are what will turn around this humanitarian catastrophe with a ceasefire.”




Jordan, along with the US, German and other European countries had been delivering food aid to Gaza by parachutes, but the scale of starvation in the Israeli-besieged enclave is barely enough, according to humanitarian agencies. (AFP)

Echoing criticism of Israel’s limits on the flow of aid, Elder said: “We need to be very clear. International humanitarian law is unequivocal. Israel has a legal obligation to facilitate aid, not just getting in, but then to ensure it is safely distributed to those most in need.”

On March 25, the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza for the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which ends in less than a fortnight.

Elder said the resolution must be “substantive and not symbolic” because a ceasefire “allows the United Nations to flood the Gaza Strip with humanitarian aid and we can turn this imminent famine around.”




A United Nations vehicle drives by as Palestinian girls share a food ration in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on March 31, 2024. (AFP)

A ceasefire, said Elder, would also allow Israel to bring home its citizens who have been held hostage in Gaza since October 7. “There are children here somewhere underground or whatever horrendous torment they are enduring,” he said. “End the torment, get hostages home.”

He added: “A ceasefire means families — a mother and a child can go to bed with absolute certainty that they will wake up. They haven’t had that for many months.”
In November and December last year, Elder said he visited Al-Nasr Hospital in Khan Younis, where the “incredible” health workers were “doing 24-36-hour shifts in a war zone.”

“They were doing the work that they knew they love to do, and they were born to do as some had said, but they were terrified because their families were outside.”




Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on March 29, 2024. (REUTERS)

Returning to Khan Younis in recent days, Elder said: “I went through it now and it’s just annihilated, street after street, rubble everywhere. I have not seen that level of devastation, which in my mind segued to here, to Rafah, and why we cannot see that happen here.”

Now, it is as though Khan Younis and Gaza City no longer exist. “Just cracked rubble and steel as far as you can see and stunned looking people, because home after home has been destroyed,” he said.

Rafah, meanwhile, “is a city of tents. It’s a city of children. This is where families were meant to go to stay safe. And there’s a desperation here, but there is a solidarity. People do what they can for each other.”

He added: “I’ve been across the Gaza Strip. In the north is a level of suffering that I can’t say defies words, but it is getting to a point where, well, we’re seeing children die of malnutrition, of dehydration.”




A mourner carries the body of a Palestinian child killed in an Israeli strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on March 29, 2024. (REUTERS)

“You see parents in tears over a child’s cot, a child who is paper thin. This is a mother who’s done everything she can to protect her child from these relentless … bombardments. And now she’s trying to protect her child from starvation.

“These mothers and fathers are learning that the real decisions about the safety of their children are being made by people elsewhere. So, there is a level of stress and anxiety across the Gaza Strip.”

Elder said the situation in Gaza “speaks to the mental trauma here of more than a million children.

“As a child psychologist said to me, we are in uncharted territory here when it comes to the mental health of girls and boys in Gaza.”
 

 


Israeli NGO warns of “quiet annexation” of West Bank under cover of war

Israeli NGO warns of “quiet annexation” of West Bank under cover of war
Updated 9 min 43 sec ago
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Israeli NGO warns of “quiet annexation” of West Bank under cover of war

Israeli NGO warns of “quiet annexation” of West Bank under cover of war
  • ACRI accuses Netanyahu govt. of “excessive, unrestrained and illegal use of force” in occupied territory in a new report
  • Says govt. is “implementing profound changes to all aspects of control, most of which are flying under the radar”

LONDON: On Oct. 12 last year, a group of armed settlers and Israeli soldiers drove into the West Bank village of Wadi Al-Seeq, 10 kilometers east of the Palestinian city of Ramallah.

There, they seized and handcuffed three Palestinian men, subjecting them to hours of abuse and violence, later compared by one of the victims to the treatment meted out by rogue US soldiers to prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2003.

The abuses in Wadi Al-Seeq were led by members of the IDF’s Sfar Hamidbar (Desert Frontier) unit, notorious for recruiting into its ranks violent “hilltop youth” from the illegal farming settlements that are proliferating in the West Bank with the blessing of Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition government, which includes, and is dependent on the support of, far-right parties.

“For hours,” as an Israeli newspaper reported on Oct. 21, 2023, the Palestinians “were severely beaten, stripped to their underwear, and photographed handcuffed.

“Their captors urinated on two of them and extinguished burning cigarettes on them. There was even an attempt to penetrate one of them with an object.”

Palestinians bound and stripped after being apprehended by IDF soldiers and settlers in the central West Bank village of Wadi Al-Seeq on October 12, 2023. (The Times of Israel)

Israeli human rights activists who arrived at the scene were also arrested, cuffed, beaten, threatened with death and, like the Palestinians, robbed.

At the time, many in Israel were shocked to read the reports of the joint operation between the IDF and settlers, exposed by the left-wing Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

But as a new report from an Israeli human rights group makes clear, such events have become commonplace as, under cover of the wars in Gaza and Lebanon, the Israeli government and its agencies have been pursuing the ultimate goal of “realizing the vision of full Israeli sovereignty in the occupied territory.”

In the report, “One year of war: the collapse of human and civil rights in Israel and the West Bank,” the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) accuses the government of “excessive, unrestrained, and illegal use of force.”

Furthermore, it says, Netanyahu’s government is “demolishing the judicial system and the civil service with the aim of accumulating unlimited power; increasing the use of force in the West Bank and granting tacit permission for unrestrained settler violence; using force to limit freedom of expression and protest; and systematically violating the rights of detainees and prisoners.”

Israeli settlers march towards the outpost of Eviatar, near the Palestinian village of Beita, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, on April 10, 2023. (AFP)

The list of charges levelled against the government is long, including institutionalized discrimination against Arab society, “unprecedented” infringement of the rights of suspects and prisoners, the “mass armament and creation of untrained forces” of settlers, the “destruction of democratic foundations,” attacks on freedom of expression and “normalization of citizen surveillance and disregard for privacy.”

Legislative steps are being taken with the aim of excluding certain parties from running for the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. Last month a controversial bill was passed to change the rules for banning individuals or parties from membership of the Knesset if they have “supported terror,” a definition which now includes visiting the family of someone accused of an act of terrorism.

Likud, Netanyahu’s party, has even accused Arab members of the Knesset of supporting terror simply on the ground of their support for Palestinian statehood.

“Depriving a population of the right to protest politically and the right to political representation” is “a very slippery slope,” said Noa Sattath, the CEO of ACRI.

“When there’s no political representation of a minority, then there's a radicalization of that minority.”

IN NUMBERS

  • 733 Palestinians killed in the West Bank since Oct. 7, 2023.
  • 40 Israelis killed during the same period.
  • 3,340 Palestinians in administrative detention as of last June.
  • 11,800 Palestinians arrested since current conflict erupted.

What the ACRI report exposes on a grand scale, says Sattath, is “the excessive use of power. Of course, we see it in Gaza, and in Lebanon now, but we also see it in the West Bank.

“We also see it being used against Israeli protesters. We’re also seeing it in the treatment of prisoners. In all walks of life, basically, the Israeli government has moved to using excessive power against the different players, rather than making more complicated decisions.”

The headline scandal of the past year is what ACRI describes as “the quiet coup” in the West Bank.

“With public attention focused elsewhere,” says the report, “the government is implementing profound changes to all aspects of control in the West Bank, most of which are flying under the radar.

“In the last two years, the government has made giant strides in advancing policies aimed at accelerating the annexation process of the West Bank, while establishing Jewish supremacy and marginalizing the Palestinian population, all in pursuit of realizing the vision of full Israeli sovereignty in the occupied territory.”

A member of the Israeli security forces walks past a bulldozer demolishing a house belonging to Palestinians in the southern area of the occupied West Bank on November 6, 2024. (AFP)

The annexation of the West Bank has long been on the agenda, said Sattath, “but the war has given cover and enabled this to happen.

“Basically, they’re creating a new reality on the ground, behind the scenes, without a lot of public scrutiny, without a lot of international discourse on this new reality that they’re manufacturing.”

The Israeli government has, in certain instances, issued statements that aim to distance itself from the violent actions of settlers in the West Bank. Netanyahu has occasionally called for calm and condemned settler attacks on Palestinians, especially after high-profile incidents.

However, ACRI fears that under the incoming US administration of Donald Trump, whose election has been welcomed so enthusiastically by far-right members of Netanyahu’s cabinet, things are only going to get worse.

A member of the Israeli security forces scuffles with a protestor as Palestinian and Israeli peace activists demonstrate at the entrance of Huwara in the occupied West Bank, on March 3, 2023. (AFP)

“I think that the next years are going to be very difficult,” said Sattath.

“The US government is one of the only checks and balances on the behavior of the Israeli government behavior and, even if we would have liked them to be more forceful in the way that they do it, we're very worried that the disappearance of that will have grave implications for the lives of Palestinians, both in Gaza, where the US is currently so involved in the humanitarian aid efforts there, and in the West Bank.”

Disturbingly, she says, Israel is manoeuvring behind the scenes to end the status of the West Bank as an occupied territory under military occupation, which is how it has been defined by international law since the occupation of the West Bank by Israel in 1967.

A picture shows burnt cars, which were set ablaze by Israeli settlers, in the area of in Al-Lubban Al-Sharqiya in the occupied West Bank on June 21, 2023. (AFP)

“It seems a little strange that an organization like ACRI would be advocating for military occupation,” she said. 

“But under international conventions military occupation gives the protected citizens of that area many different rights and gives the occupiers obligations. 

“Residents in occupied territories cannot be moved. You cannot build on their territory and the occupying force has all sorts of obligations toward them, in terms of humanitarian aid. 

“Now, what the settler movement, through its ministers in the government, is trying to do is erase the military occupation, replacing it with government agencies and officials to facilitate the settlement enterprise.” 

A Palestinian man walks at the village of Khallet Al-Daba, in the occupied West Bank on October 26, 2023, after it was attacked by Israeli settlers. (AFP)

The process began in February 2023 when, despite disquiet among some members of Netanyahu’s government, authority over many civilian issues in the West Bank was stripped from Defense Ministry agency COGAT (Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories) and transferred to Bezalel Smotrich, the religious Zionism leader and finance minister. 

According to a Times of Israel report, the agreement “appears to give the ultranationalist leader sweeping powers over the territory, and allows him to advance his goal of thwarting Palestinian aspirations for a state in the West Bank by enabling the Israeli population there to substantially expand.”

Anti-settlement organizations denounced the agreement, with one, Breaking the Silence, saying it amounted to “legal, de jure annexation,” of the West Bank.

The importance of ACRI’s report, says Sattath, lies in the sheer breadth of abuses by the Israeli government it exposes.

Israeli security forces fire tear gas at Palestinians demonstrating in the village of Beita, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank, on April 10, 2023. (AFP)

ACRI, founded in 1972 and the oldest civil and human rights organization in Israel, has been publishing reports on the state of human rights in Israel and the West Bank for decades. But, she says, “we have never published a report showing such a severe and comprehensive deterioration as we have seen over the past year.”

ACRI says it hopes its report “will deepen the public’s understanding of the damage being done to human rights and democratic institutions, and that it will stir the public to action and resistance.”

It added: “Monitoring human rights violation processes is also critical for there to be any hope of correction under a different government and reality.”

 


Sirens sound in central, northern Israel after ceasefire announcement: army

Sirens sound in central, northern Israel after ceasefire announcement: army
Updated 11 min 37 sec ago
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Sirens sound in central, northern Israel after ceasefire announcement: army

Sirens sound in central, northern Israel after ceasefire announcement: army
  • Sirens sounded in a number of areas in central and northern Israel following projectiles that crossed from Lebanon

JERUSALEM: Israel’s military said sirens sounded across central and northern Israel Tuesday, with three projectiles fired from Lebanon after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his cabinet would vote for a ceasefire.
“Sirens sounded in a number of areas in central and northern Israel following projectiles that crossed from Lebanon,” the military said in a statement. “Three projectiles that crossed from Lebanon into Israeli territory were successfully intercepted by the IAF (Israeli air force).”


UAE thanks Turkiye for helping to arrest Zvi Kogan murder suspects

The UAE expressed sincere condolences to the family of murder victim Zvi Kogan. (Reuters via social media)
The UAE expressed sincere condolences to the family of murder victim Zvi Kogan. (Reuters via social media)
Updated 13 min 3 sec ago
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UAE thanks Turkiye for helping to arrest Zvi Kogan murder suspects

The UAE expressed sincere condolences to the family of murder victim Zvi Kogan. (Reuters via social media)
  • Sincere condolences’ expressed to family of Moldovan-Israeli national
  • Three men arrested were named as Olimboy Tohirovich, 28, Makhmudjon Abdurakhim, 28, and Azizbek Kamilovich, 33

DUBAI: The UAE has thanked Turkiye for helping in the arrest of three men suspected of murdering Moldovan-Israeli rabbi Zvi Kogan.

It was reported on Monday that three Uzbek nationals had been detained and were being investigated over the killing.

The UAE “expressed its sincere condolences and solidarity” with the family of Kogan, 28, the Emirates News Agency reported on Tuesday.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs extended its sincere appreciation to the authorities in the Republic of Turkiye for their cooperation in arresting the perpetrators,” the agency said.

The ministry “commended the exceptional diligence and professionalism” of the  authorities overseeing the case.

The Ministry of Interior said on Sunday that the three arrests had been made in “record time” after Kogan’s family had reported him missing.

A specialized search and investigation team was assembled leading to the discovery of the victim’s body.

The three men arrested were named as Olimboy Tohirovich, 28, Makhmudjon Abdurakhim, 28, and Azizbek Kamilovich, 33.

The Foreign Ministry’s statement on Tuesday said the UAE is committed to upholding the principles of tolerance and peaceful coexistence among diverse religions and cultures.


Erdogan ally wants pro-Kurdish party, jailed militant to talk

Erdogan ally wants pro-Kurdish party, jailed militant to talk
Updated 26 November 2024
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Erdogan ally wants pro-Kurdish party, jailed militant to talk

Erdogan ally wants pro-Kurdish party, jailed militant to talk
  • The pro-Kurdish DEM Party, parliament’s third largest, responded by applying for its co-chairs to meet with Ocalan, founder of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)

ANKARA: A key ally of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan expanded on his proposal to end 40 years of conflict with Kurdish militants by proposing on Tuesday that parliament’s pro-Kurdish party holds direct talks with the militants’ jailed leader Abdullah Ocalan.
Devlet Bahceli, leader of the Nationalist Movement Party, made the call a month after suggesting that Ocalan announce an end to the insurgency in exchange for the possibility of his release.
The pro-Kurdish DEM Party, parliament’s third largest, responded by applying for its co-chairs to meet with Ocalan, founder of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
Erdogan described Bahceli’s initial proposal as a “historic window of opportunity” but has not spoken of any peace process.
Ocalan has been held in a prison on the island of Imrali, south of Istanbul, since his capture 25 years ago.
“We expect face-to-face contact between Imrali and the DEM group to be made without delay, and we resolutely reiterate our call,” Bahceli told his party’s lawmakers in a parliamentary meeting, using the name of the island to refer to Ocalan.
Bahceli regularly condemns pro-Kurdish politicians as tools of the PKK.
DEM’s predecessor party was involved in peace talks between Ankara and Ocalan a decade ago. Gulistan Kilic Kocyigit, DEM’s parliamentary group chairperson, said it applied to the Justice Ministry on Tuesday for its leaders to meet Ocalan.
“We are ready to make every contribution for a democratic solution to the Kurdish issue and the democratization of Turkiye,” she said.
Turkiye and its Western allies call the PKK a terrorist group. More than 40,000 people have been killed in the fighting, which in the past was focused in the mainly Kurdish southeast but is now centered on northern Iraq, where the PKK is based.
Growing regional instability and changing political dynamics are seen as factors behind the bid to end the conflict with the PKK. The chances of success are unclear as Ankara has given no clues on what it may entail.
The only concrete move so far has been Ankara’s permission for Ocalan’s nephew to visit him, the first family visit in 4-1/2 years.
Authorities are continuing to crack down on alleged PKK activities. Early on Tuesday, police detained 231 people of suspected PKK ties, the interior ministry said. DEM Party said those detained included its local officials and activists.
Earlier this month, the government replaced five pro-Kurdish mayors in southeastern cities for similar reasons, in a move that drew criticism from DEM and others.
 

 


Algeria holds writer Boualem Sansal on national security charges: lawyer

Algeria holds writer Boualem Sansal on national security charges: lawyer
Updated 26 November 2024
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Algeria holds writer Boualem Sansal on national security charges: lawyer

Algeria holds writer Boualem Sansal on national security charges: lawyer
  • “Boualem Sansal... was today placed in detention” on the basis of an article of the Algerian penal code, lawyer Francois Zimeray said
  • Sansal had been interrogated by “anti-terrorist” prosecutors and said he was being “deprived of his freedom on the grounds of his writing“

PARIS: Algerian authorities have remanded in custody on national security charges prominent French-Algerian novelist Boualem Sansal following his arrest earlier this month that sparked alarm throughout the literary world, his French lawyer said on Tuesday.
“Boualem Sansal... was today placed in detention” on the basis of an article of the Algerian penal code “which punishes all attacks on state security,” lawyer Francois Zimeray said in a statement to AFP.
He added that Sansal had been interrogated by “anti-terrorist” prosecutors and said he was being “deprived of his freedom on the grounds of his writing.”
Sansal, a major figure in francophone modern literature, is known for his strong stances against both authoritarianism and Islamism, as well as being a forthright campaigner on freedom of expression issues.
His detention by Algeria comes against a background of tensions between France and its former colony, which also appear to have spread to the literary world.
The 75-year-old writer, granted French nationality this year, was on November 16 arrested at Algiers airport after returning from France, according to several media reports.
The Gallimard publishing house, which has published his work for a quarter of a century, in a statement expressed “its very deep concern following the arrest of the writer by the Algerian security services,” calling for his “immediate release.”
A relative latecomer to writing, Sansal turned to novels in 1999 and has tackled subjects including the horrific 1990s civil war between authorities and Islamists.
His books are not banned in Algeria but he is a controversial figure, particularly since making a visit to Israel in 2014.
Sansal’s hatred of Islamism has not been confined to Algeria and he has also warned of a creeping Islamization in France, a stance that has made him a favored author of prominent figures on the right and far-right.
In 2015, Sansal won the Grand Prix du Roman of the French Academy, the guardians of the French language, for his book “2084: The End of the World,” a dystopian novel inspired by George Orwell’s “Nineteen-Eighty Four” and set in an Islamist totalitarian world in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust.
The concerns about his reported arrest come as another prominent French-Algerian writer Kamel Daoud is under attack over his novel “Houris,” which won France’s top literary prize, the Goncourt.
A woman has claimed the book was based on her story of surviving 1990s Islamist massacres and used without her consent.
She alleged on Algerian television that Daoud used the story she confidentially recounted to a therapist — who is now his wife — during treatment. His publisher has denied the claims.
The controversies are taking place in a tense diplomatic context between France and Algeria, after President Emmanuel Macron renewed French support for Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed territory of Western Sahara during a landmark visit to the kingdom last month.
Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony, is de facto controlled for the most part by Morocco.
But it is claimed by the Sahrawi separatists of the Polisario Front, who are demanding a self-determination referendum and are supported by Algiers.
Daoud organized a petition signed by fellow literary luminaries published in the Le Point weekly calling for Sansal’s “immediate” release.
“This tragic news reflects an alarming reality in Algeria, where freedom of expression is nothing more than a memory in the face of repression, imprisonment and the surveillance of the entire society,” said the letter also signed by the likes of British novelist Salman Rushdie and Turkish Nobel winner Orhan Pamuk.