Ahmad Sa'adat

Ahmad Sa'adat (also transliterated from Arabic as Ahmed Sadat/Saadat, Arabic: احمد سعدات) is a Palestinian politician, and Secretary-General of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). He was controversially imprisoned in Jericho by the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) in 2002.

Sa'adat succeeded Abu Ali Mustafa to the post in 2001, after he was assassinated by Israel at his office in Ramallah on the West Bank. Sa'adat was accused by Israel of organizing PFLP's retaliatory assassination of Rehavam Zeevi, and took up refuge in the al-Muqata'a headquarters of PLO leader Yassir Arafat, who refused to hand him over to Israel. Israel, on the other hand, refused to back down from its arrest order.

After negotiations involving the United States of America and Great Britain, an agreement was reached in between Israel and the PNA. Israel called off the siege of al-Muqata'a, and Sa'adat was arrested, given a military trial and put in a Palestinian jail in Jericho, with a force of US and British guards overseeing his captivity.[1] He was not allowed to run for political office, give interviews or address the public, although these bans have sometimes been circumvented or ignored. (See Ma'an interview below.)

The Palestinian Supreme Court declared that this was unconstitutional, and ordered his release, but the PNA refused to comply. Amnesty International has declared that this, and the fact that he received an unfair trial, makes his detention illegal, and that he must either be charged with a crime and given due process, or released. The organization also called on Israel to declare that it would not target him for assassination if freed.[2]

On Tuesday, March 14, 2006, the US and Britain withdrew monitors from the Jericho jail where Saadat was being held. The prison was then surrounded by Israeli forces. In the ensuing stand-off, Palestinian guards left the prison but 200 prisoners refused to surrender.

After daylong shelling by Israeli tanks in which three Palestinian civilians were killed, Israeli military forces took Sa'adat and five other inmates into custody. After his arrest, he was interrogated by the Israeli Shabak. As of March 16, it has not been decided whether Sa'adat and the other suspects will stand for trial in a regular Israeli court or a military tribunal.