RAMALLAH, March 14, 2012 (WAFA) – The defense attorney for Bassem Tamimi, the Palestinian activist from the Ramallah area village of Nabi Saleh, Wednesday urged the Israeli military court hearing Tamimi’s case to dismiss testimonies of two Palestinian minors aimed at incriminating the activist, according to the script of the court hearing,

The trial of Tamimi, arrested a year ago and charged of organizing protests and inciting to violence, was held at Ofer military camp near Ramallah and was attended by a large number of diplomats.

The European Union considers Tamimi a human rights defender and Amnesty International had recently pronounced him a prisoner of conscience.

As Tamimi’s trial draws to an end, his lawyer's closing arguments accused Israeli authorities of having knowingly abused the minors' rights in order to incriminate his client.

Labib Habib, Tamimi's lawyer, opened his closing arguments by asserting that, 'Watching the recordings of the two interrogations [...] will reveal a shocking image to the court, of how the Israeli police, entrusted with enforcing the law, investigated two boys of 14 and 15 years old in a rampant, illegal and indecent manner that violates all rules of interrogations.'

He said the boys' rights were violated and that they were led to say what the interrogators wanted to hear. He described how both were arrested by Israeli soldiers at gunpoint from their beds in the dead of night; how they were beaten up, blindfolded, cuffed with their hands behind their back, and how they were left that way the whole night, without being allowed sleep, in a military base, until they were sent to the police for interrogation in the morning.

The boys were questioned for more than four hours each despite not having slept and that they were intimidated and coached into incriminating Tamimi.

Habib requested the court to clear Tamimi of all charges against him, stressing that the minors' testimonies should be ruled inadmissible.

M.S.