Rights Activist Held by Palestinians Freed

A Palestinian human rights activist critical of PLO leader Yasser Arafat was detained by Palestinian security forces for about 24 hours before being released Wednesday after stiff protests by Israel.

Bassam Eid, an East Jerusalem resident with Israeli citizenship, told Israel Radio he was freed from a security office in the West Bank town of Ramallah, newly under Palestinian self-rule, after meeting with an Israeli Arab advisor to Arafat.

Eid, 38, spoke out recently against the arrest of Palestinian editor Maher Alami, who refused to publish a story about Arafat on a newspaper front page. Alami was freed after being held for six days.

Eid said he did not know which Palestinian security service held him. Palestine Liberation Organization sources said earlier that members of Force 17, one of several security bodies operating under Palestinian self-rule, were holding Eid.

“I wasn’t in jail. I sat in the office. I received all I requested. I wasn’t interrogated at all. . . . Everyone who came into the office was simply surprised to see me there and asked me what I was doing,” Eid said.

“I said, ‘In truth, I don’t know.’ ”

Eid said he was freed after meeting with Ahmed Tibi, the Arafat advisor. “I was released. I found Dr. Ahmed Tibi in some room. I entered the room, and then they came and said simply there was a misunderstanding here.”

Rights activists had said earlier that Eid was taken from his home late Tuesday and held in Ramallah.

Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres’ spokesman, Yarden Vatikay, had said efforts were being made to “get him back.”

“He’s an Israeli citizen and certainly the prime minister does not look well on this,” Vatikay said.

Members of Israel’s ruling Labor Party had urged Peres to demand that Arafat order Eid’s release.

Yizhar Beer, director-general of Btselem, an Israeli group that monitors human rights in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, said Eid had called after his arrest. Eid is a Btselem researcher.

“He said a Palestinian police officer came to his home at 11 p.m. [Tuesday] in East Jerusalem and asked him to accompany him for questioning,” Beer said. “His wife called me this morning [Wednesday] and said he was under arrest.”

Beer said that because Eid is an Israeli citizen, the arrest was illegal under terms of Israeli-PLO peace deals that launched Palestinian rule in parts of the West Bank and Gaza.

The Palestinian Authority is barred from making arrests in East Jerusalem and other areas not under Palestinian rule.

Beer said Palestinian security officials had threatened Eid after he helped write a report in August citing torture by Palestinian police.