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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: bentway who wrote (263387)	5/5/2008 9:15:06 PM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 281500

Appeal Is Made to Bush To Save Arab Accused of Helping Israel Famed Refusenik Issues a Call To Save an Arab By ELI LAKE Staff Reporter of the Sun May 5, 2008 Nayef Hashlamoun / Reuters An officer in the Palestinian Authority’s National Security Forces, Imad Sa’ad, is led away after being sentenced to death by a Palestinian military court on April 28 for collaborating with Israel, court officials and security sources said. WASHINGTON — A Palestinian Authority police officer accused of helping Israel with counterterrorism is facing death at the hands of a firing line unless a last-minute appeal to President Bush can save him. The cause of the police officer, Imad Sa'ad, is being championed by a woman who became famous as a political prisoner in the Soviet Union before she moved to Israel in 1987, Ida Nudel. It comes as Secretary of State Rice this weekend arrived in Israel for another round of diplomacy aimed at creating an independent Palestinian Arab state before the end of the Bush presidency. The case raises questions about the intentions of Prime Minister Abbas's Fatah government in the West Bank. Mr. Sa'ad, a former member of the Palestinian Authority's national security forces, is accused of providing the Israel Defense Forces with the whereabouts of four accused Palestinian terrorists Mr. Abbas's regime was unwilling to hand over to the Israelis. In a court in Hebron he was convicted of being a collaborator. But cooperation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority on counterterrorism is a precondition under agreements for the relinquishment of land for a Palestinian Arab state. What's more, the sentence against Mr. Sa'ad was meted out by a judge from Fatah, which is Mr. Abbas's Palestinian faction and the one that Ms. Rice hopes her diplomacy will strengthen against Hamas, the Iranian-backed terrorists who now control Gaza. "Sa'ad's crime was simply reporting to Israeli authorities on the whereabouts of four fugitive Palestinian gunmen that the PA was unwilling to arrest," the director of the Israel Law Center, Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, writes in a letter that will be sent to Mr. Bush today. "Fortunately, the security services were able to utilize the information and take out the terrorists before they could unleash any further attacks on Israeli civilians. This operation saved the lives of scores of Israelis and other innocent victims. It is no different than the recent preventive American army attack on Al Qaeda terrorists in Somalia. However, for assisting in this operation, Sa'ad was arrested and sentenced to death by a Palestinian firing squad." Ms. Darshan-Leitner asks for President Bush to suspend $200 million in security assistance promised to Mr. Abbas and the Palestinian Authority until Mr. Sa'ad's sentence is overturned. She has also sent out similar appeals to the European Union and the Vatican.