ALGIERS: An Algiers appeals court on Tuesday reduced historian Mohamed Amine Belghit’s prison sentence from five years to three, with two years suspended, following his conviction over comments dismissing the existence of Amazigh culture.
The Amazigh, often called Berbers, are North Africa’s indigenous people, predating the Arab conquests of the 7th century, with communities across Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia and beyond.
Belghit was originally sentenced in July after saying in a televised interview that “the Amazigh language is an ideological project of Franco-Zionist origin,” and that “there’s no such thing as Amazigh culture.”
He was arrested in May and charged with undermining national unity and spreading hate speech, as well as insulting national symbols, prosecutors said at the time.
On Tuesday, his lawyer Toufik Hichour said on Facebook that the appeals court had reduced the sentence “to three years in prison and two years suspended.”
Belghit, a university professor, is no stranger to controversy.
His remarks have repeatedly sparked outrage, with critics accusing him of historical revisionism and hostility toward the Amazigh community.
Algeria granted official status to Tamazight, the language of the Amazigh, in 2016.
The following year, the Amazigh new year celebration, Yennayer, was added to the list of national holidays.
Algeria cuts jail time for historian who questioned Amazigh culture
https://arab.news/w5dtd
Algeria cuts jail time for historian who questioned Amazigh culture
- He was arrested in May and charged with undermining national unity and spreading hate speech
- His lawyer said the appeals court had reduced the sentence “to three years in prison and two years suspended“
Israeli airstrike on a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon kills 13 people, Lebanese ministry says
- Hamas condemned the attack in a statement saying the strike hit a sports playground and denying that it was a training compound
- Lebanon’s Health Ministry has reported more than 270 people killed and around 850 wounded by Israeli military actions since the ceasefire
SIDON, Lebanon: An Israeli airstrike on a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon on Tuesday killed 13 people and wounded several others, state media and government officials said. It was the deadliest strike on Lebanon since a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war a year ago.
The drone strike hit a car in the parking lot of a mosque in the Ein el-Hilweh refugee camp on the outskirts of the coastal city of Sidon, the state-run National News Agency said. The Lebanese Health Ministry said 13 people were killed and several others wounded in the airstrike, without giving further details.
Hamas fighters in the area prevented journalists from reaching the scene, as ambulances rushed to evacuate the wounded and the dead.
The Israeli military said it struck a Hamas training compound that was being used to prepare an attack against Israel and its army. It added that the Israeli army would continue to act against Hamas wherever the group operates.
Hamas condemned the attack in a statement saying the strike hit a sports playground and denying that it was a training compound.
Over the past two years, Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon have killed scores of officials from the militant Hezbollah group as well as Palestinian factions such as Hamas.
Saleh Arouri, the deputy political head of Hamas and a founder of the group’s military wing, was killed in a drone strike on a southern suburb of Beirut on Jan. 2, 2024. Several other Hamas officials have been killed in strikes since then.
Hamas led the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel that killed about 1,200 people. That sparked Israel’s offensive on the Gaza Strip that killed tens of thousands of Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
A day after the Israel-Hamas war started, Hezbollah began firing rockets toward Israeli posts along the border. Israel responded with shelling and airstrikes in Lebanon, and the two sides became locked in an escalating conflict that became a full-blown war in late September 2024.
That war, the most recent of several conflicts involving Hezbollah over the past four decades, killed more than 4,000 people in Lebanon, including hundreds of civilians, and caused an estimated $11 billion worth of destruction, according to the World Bank. In Israel, 127 people died, including 80 soldiers.
The war ended in late November 2024 with a US-brokered ceasefire. Since then, Israel has carried out scores of airstrikes in Lebanon, saying that Hezbollah is trying to rebuild its capabilities.
Lebanon’s Health Ministry has reported more than 270 people killed and around 850 wounded by Israeli military actions since the ceasefire.
