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Tamimi to appear in military court two days after Israel declares her hometown a ‘closed military zone’
Bassem Tamimi speaks in front of a poster showing his daughter Ahed at his home in Nabi Saleh

PALESTINIAN schoolgirl Ahed Tamimi will appear in an occupation military court tomorrow for slapping Israeli troops where she faces 10 years in jail.

Her hearing at the Ofer Israeli army court in the occupied West Bank takes place two days after the occupation forces declared her home village of Nabi Saleh a “closed military zone,” blocking routes in and out and attacking a protest there.

The village, north of Ramallah, was closed off before a planned demonstration against US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Israel’s claim to Jerusalem as its capital.

Residents also planned to march to the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Halamish, which has annexed large areas of farmland belonging to the Tamimi extended family between Nabi Saleh and nearby Deir Nidham.

Palestine’s Wafa news agency quoted local leader Bilal Tamimi as saying Israeli forces prevented non-residents from entering the village in support of the rally.

He said some found alternative routes in, avoiding the roadblocks, and the rally went ahead, but the occupation forces reacted with tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets. Locals said dozens suffered tear-gas inhalation and two were shot and injured by troops.

Sixteen-year-old Ahed and her mother Nariman were arrested in Nabi Saleh last month, four days after video emerged of a previous demonstration against Mr Trump’s announcement, showing her harmlessly slapping and kicking two armed Israeli troops.

That was hours after her 15-year-old cousin Mohammed had been shot in the head with a steel-coated pellet. Mohammed survived after surgery but will need a prosthetic plate to replace part of his skull.

Ahed faces charges of aggravated assault and 11 other offences.

Britain’s Amnesty International Middle East deputy director Magdalena Mughrabi joined calls yesterday for Ahed’s release “without delay.”

She quoted Ahed’s lawyer comments that she had “faced several long and aggressive interrogation sessions, sometimes during the night, and has received threats against her family by interrogators.”

According to her family, Ahed has also endured several physically exhausting transfers from prison to court alongside other child detainees, without access to a toilet.

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