Palestinian protest icon Ahed Tamimi arrested for calling to ‘slaughter’ settlers

Prominent Palestinian activist Ahed Tamimi was arrested Monday after posting on social media that Palestinians will “slaughter” settlers and “drink your blood.”

“Our message to the herds of settlers is that we are waiting for you in all the West Bank cities, from Hebron to Jenin,” Tamimi wrote in a post last week.

“We will slaughter you and you will say that what Hitler did to you was a joke, we will drink your blood and eat your skulls. Come on, we’re waiting for you,” she wrote.

Tamimi’s arrest was hailed by National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.

“Well done to the IDF and the other security forces who arrested the terrorist and ‘human rights activist’ Ahed Tamimi from Nabi Saleh, who was previously convicted of attacking IDF soldiers and since the outbreak of the war has expressed sympathy and support for the human animal Nazis on social media,” the far-right minister, who was convicted of incitement in 2007, wrote on X.

Tamimi became an icon of the Palestinian cause after she was jailed as a teenager for slapping an Israeli soldier. She said the soldiers had shot her cousin in the head with a rubber bullet an hour prior to the filmed encounter.

כל הכבוד לכוחות צה"ל שעצרו הלילה את המחבלת ו"פעילת זכויות האדם" עהד תמימי מנבי סאלח שהורשעה בעבר בתקיפת חיילי צה"ל ומאז פרוץ המלחמה מביעה הזדהות ותמיכה בחיות האדם הנאצים ברשתות החברתיות. אפס סובלנות עם מחבלים ועם תומכי טרור! רק ככה! pic.twitter.com/YeozAiUxvd

— איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) November 6, 2023

Tamimi, who was 16 at the time, admitted as part of a plea deal to the aggravated assault of an IDF soldier, incitement to violence, and disrupting soldiers on two other occasions.

She served an eight-month sentence in an Israeli prison, and after she was released, went on a victory tour, crisscrossing Europe and the Middle East.

East Jerusalem arrests

In parallel to Tamimi’s detention, police announced Monday that security forces arrested 23 Palestinians in East Jerusalem suspected of violence at protests and of social media posts backing violence and terror.

Police said that some of those arrested were detained for their alleged involvement in rioting, and added that officers seized weapons, ammunition, a protective vest, and money during raids.

Others were detained on suspicion of publishing incitement to violence and terrorism, and support for Hamas.

In the days following the October 7 massacres, in which some 1,400 Israelis, mostly civilians, were butchered by Hamas terrorists, the State Attorney’s Office issued a blanket permit to the police to open investigations into possible incidents of incitement to, and praise for, terrorism by Israeli citizens and residents of East Jerusalem.

The police are permitted to open investigations even on the basis of a lone incident, as long as it is deemed a severe violation of the prohibition against incitement or praise of terrorism, and relates to the October 7 attack and the current war.

The State Attorney’s Office has filed dozens of indictments against Arab citizens for incitement to terrorism over the past month, based almost exclusively on inflammatory social media posts.

Meanwhile, the State Attorney’s Office has yet to indict any citizen for incitement to violence or racism against either Arabs or those deemed “leftists” since Hamas’s October 7 atrocities, despite inflammatory rhetoric on social media over the same period.

In response to a query by The Times of Israel, the spokesperson’s department of the Justice Ministry said that “the State Attorney’s Office has authorized the Israel Police to open a number of investigations for crimes of incitement against Jewish suspects, but they have not been passed to the State Attorney’s Office for a decision.”

The Justice Ministry said that “once they are passed back to the State Attorney’s Office, and should there be evidentiary proof of incitement to violence or racism, the State Attorney’s Office will file indictments regardless of the identity of the accused.”