Morocco Denies Amnesty International Claims on Gdeim Izik Prisoner Case

General view of Tiflet Prison, where Sahrawi activist Mohamed Lamine Hadi was being held (Asharq Al-Awsat)
General view of Tiflet Prison, where Sahrawi activist Mohamed Lamine Hadi was being held (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Morocco Denies Amnesty International Claims on Gdeim Izik Prisoner Case

General view of Tiflet Prison, where Sahrawi activist Mohamed Lamine Hadi was being held (Asharq Al-Awsat)
General view of Tiflet Prison, where Sahrawi activist Mohamed Lamine Hadi was being held (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Morocco’s General Delegation for Prison Administration denied on Tuesday recent claims by Amnesty International regarding torture and human rights violations against a prisoner detained in connection with the Gdim Izik Incidents.

The country’s prison authority said in a statement that the prisoner, detained at the local prison of Tiflet 2 over Gdim Izik case which dates back to 2010, “has never been subjected to any assault by the prison staff.”

“Like all inmates, he enjoys all the rights stipulated in the law regulating prisons.”

The Gdeim Izik incident involved a protest camp, known as Gdeim Izik, which was set up by a group of people demanding greater economic and social opportunities.

Moroccan security forces dismantled the protest camp in November 2010, which lead to clashes with Polisario members, who killed 12 police officers.

The Administration said that Amnesty International is “spreading a set of lies by seizing the propaganda of the enemies of Morocco’s territorial integrity, and trying to turn it into facts without making any effort to verify its authenticity.”

In addition, it described the NGO’s practices as a “blatant violation of the basics of the human rights work that the organization claims to practice.”

In its recently published report on “the state of the world’s human rights,” Amnesty International claimed that “torture and other ill-treatment continued with impunity both inside and out of prisons, particularly against Sahrawi activists.”



UN Agency Says Israel Shuts 4 Schools in East Jerusalem

A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)
A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)
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UN Agency Says Israel Shuts 4 Schools in East Jerusalem

A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)
A boy stands outside the gate of the Kalandia vocational training center (KTC), run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which was raided by Israeli forces earlier at the Qalandiya camp for Palestinian refugees in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees says Israeli forces raided four of its schools in east Jerusalem, ordering their closure.

Israel has severed all ties with the agency, known as UNRWA, and bars it from operating in its territory. It says the agency allowed itself to be infiltrated by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, allegations denied by UN officials.

UNRWA said police entered a training center by force on Tuesday, firing tear gas and sound grenades and ordering its evacuation. It said 350 students and 30 staff were present during the raid on the Qalandiya Training Center.

It said police and city officials ordered the closure of three other schools in east Jerusalem, two of which proceeded with the school day.

Israeli police spokesman Dean Elsdunne said police did not enter the UN buildings and that Jerusalem municipal authorities carried out the closures. He said police were deployed to protect the city workers, using “riot dispersal” means in one case where a crowd threw stones at them outside a UN facility.

Roland Friedrich, UNRWA director for the occupied West Bank, including east Jerusalem, said the raids were an “unacceptable violation of United Nations privileges and immunities,” and a “denial of the right to education for children and trainees.”