Undue process

Ha'aretz By Ilana Hammerman

... at this moment, all the woman's attention, all her emotions, all her physical sensations, after many days and nights of tense anticipation, are focused on the son behind the partition, who cannot be touched, whom she can only speak to on this telephone. He has one telephone receiver on his side and they have two, one for the father and one for the mother. But only one of them at a time can listen to him, not both at once. It is not a conference call.

But anyway, there's not that much to say in such circumstances: A hug, a kiss - that's what was really needed here, in this big room with dozens of people sitting in long rows on either side of the see-through partition, speaking into telephones. So how are you? Fine. How are things? Okay. Are you eating? Yes. The food is okay? Yes, well, not so much. Did you bring the clothes I asked for? Yes, I brought them, but they won't let them in. Why? I brought short pants but they said they have it written down that you requested long pants. I brought sandals. But sandals aren't allowed. I brought a green shirt, but green is forbidden, and so is light blue and dark blue. Give them a new list. But I need sandals, my feet are too hot in the shoes. What can I do? Sandals are forbidden....

.....The military prosecutor who appealed the decision to release Sa'ed to house arrest argued that "in the event that he is convicted of the crimes attributed to him, he would be sentenced to 10 years in prison." The judge looked at her tiredly and asked: "10 years?" And the word "ten" - which I heard with my own ears and which even caused me to blurt out an embarrassing shout in the courtroom in which the only other spectators were Sa'ed's father and mother - the word "ten" was erased from the protocol and replaced by a phrase frightening in its arbitrariness: "He shall be sentenced to years in prison." Years in prison for vague membership and a vague meeting and painting vague slogans, which, as military judge Capt. Lior Kahane pointed out, can hardly be pinpointed in any way, shape or form.... Full story