Samaher Esmail
WHAT HAPPENED
Samaher Esmail, a 46-year-old U.S. citizen from Gretna, Louisiana, where she managed a family grocery store, was seized in a night raid on February 5, 2024, when Israeli soldiers forced their way into a home she owns in Silwad, a Palestinian town northeast of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. Her family said the soldiers dragged her from her bed without her headscarf and beat her; Israel's military charged her with "incitement" over social-media posts. According to court documents and a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken from a consultant working for her family, she was denied a lawyer for four days, went without medication for cancer and kidney conditions for at least six days, and fainted in custody, while a U.S. consular officer did not visit for 14 days. Held at Damon prison inside Israel, she was released on bail on February 29, 2024, to await trial in an Israeli military court.
TESTIMONY
“They broke into her house and pulled her out, took her out of her bed.” — Mubarak Esmail, Samaher Esmail’s brother
SOURCES
DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY FOR
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