ALGIERS: An Algerian court on Thursday released opposition figure Fethi Ghares and his wife under judicial supervision pending an investigation into the alleged insulting of President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and other charges, his lawyer said.
Ghares, a secular leftist opposition figure, was charged with “insulting the president of the republic” and “spreading false news and hate speech through posts on social media,” Abdelghani Badi, his lawyer, told AFP.
Messaouda Cheballah, Ghares’s wife who is also a political activist, was charged with “partaking” in the main defendant’s alleged wrongdoing, Badi added.
Badi said the couple are required to “report to the court every 15 days” pending a trial date.
The couple were also banned from posting information on social media or speaking to the media, said the lawyer, ahead of elections on September 7.
Fethi Ghares, 49, a former coordinator of the now-banned leftist Democratic and Social Movement party, was arrested on Tuesday by plain-clothes police at his home in the capital Algiers.
In a video posted on Facebook and titled “Where’s Fethi Ghares?,” his wife had said police asked her husband to follow them for what they said was “an interrogation” and that he had had no summons order.
Ghares, 49, was previously arrested in 2021 and later sentenced to prison — also on charges including insulting President Tebboune.
In January 2022, he was sentenced to two years behind bars for “harming the person of the president of the republic” and “spreading information that could harm national unity” and public order.
He was released in March 2022 after his sentence was reduced on appeal.
A figure from Algeria’s secular leftist opposition, Ghares in 2019 joined the pro-democracy Hirak movement — mass protests that swept veteran president Abdelaziz Bouteflika from power.
His Democratic and Social Movement party — a successor of the Algerian Communist Party — had all its activities indefinitely frozen by the authorities in February 2023.
Algeria opposition figure released under judicial supervision
https://arab.news/8pexs
Algeria opposition figure released under judicial supervision
- Ghares, a secular leftist opposition figure, was charged with “insulting the president of the republic”
Family of Palestinian-American shot dead by Israeli settler demand accountability
- Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community
LONDON: The family of a 19-year-old Palestinian-American man reportedly shot dead by an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank have demanded accountability, amid mounting scrutiny over a surge in settler violence and a lack of prosecutions.
Nasrallah Abu Siyam, a US citizen born in Philadelphia, was killed near the city of Ramallah on Wednesday, becoming at least the sixth American citizen to die in incidents involving Israeli settlers or soldiers in the territory in the past two years.
Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community. Witnesses said that stones were thrown by both sides before settlers opened fire, wounding at least three villagers.
Abu Siyam was struck and later died of his injuries.
Abdulhamid Siyam, the victim’s cousin, said the killing reflected a wider pattern of impunity.
“A young man of 19 shot and killed in cold blood, and no responsibility,” he told the BBC. “Impunity completely.”
The US State Department said that it was aware of the death of a US citizen and was “carefully monitoring the situation,” while the Trump administration said that it stood ready to provide consular assistance.
The Israeli embassy in Washington said the incident was under review and that an operational inquiry “must be completed as soon as possible.”
A spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces said troops were deployed to the scene and used “riot dispersal means to restore order,” adding that no IDF gunfire was reported.
The military confirmed that the incident remained under review and said that a continued presence would be maintained in the area to prevent further unrest.
Palestinians and human rights organizations say such reviews rarely lead to criminal accountability, arguing that Israeli authorities routinely fail to prosecute settlers accused of violence.
A US embassy spokesperson later said that Washington “condemns this violence,” as international concern continues to grow over conditions in the occupied West Bank.
Palestinians and human rights groups say Israeli authorities routinely fail to investigate or prosecute settlers accused of violence against civilians.
Those concerns were echoed this week by the UN, which warned that Israel’s actions in the occupied West Bank may amount to ethnic cleansing.
A UN human rights office report on Thursday said that Israeli settlement expansion, settler attacks and military operations have increasingly displaced Palestinian communities, with dozens of villages reportedly emptied since the start of the Gaza war.
The report also criticized Israeli military tactics in the northern West Bank, saying that they resembled warfare and led to mass displacement, while noting abuses by Palestinian security forces, including the use of unnecessary lethal force and the intimidation of critics.
Neither Israel’s foreign ministry nor the Palestinian Authority has commented on the findings.
