The Palestinian Authority cuts loose a prominent activist a week after he was arrested for writing a Facebook post criticizing PA President Mahmoud Abbas.
Issa Amro’s lawyer says that his client was released on $1,400 bail after being held under a recent edict that allows the government to crack down on social media critics.
In a Facebook post earlier this month, Amro criticized the detention of a local journalist who had called for Abbas’s resignation.
Palestinian activist Issa Amro arrives for a hearing at the Ofer military court on July 9, 2017, in the town of Betunia, near the West Bank city of Ramallah. (AFP Photo/Abbas Momani)
Amro’s attorney, Farid Atrash, says it is “shameful” that his client was arrested for exercising his right of free expression.
Amro, a 35-year-old activist who advocates non-violence and protests against Israeli settlements in his hometown of Hebron, also faces charges in an Israeli military court. His trial is to resume in October.
— AFP
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