In a dawn raid on August 1, 2018, Israeli forces arrested Mohammed Muna, reporter for the London-based news agency Al-Quds Press and director of the Nablus-based Radio Hawa, at his house in the village of Zuata, 5 km (3.1 miles) west of Nablus, according to his employer, news reports, and the regional press freedom group SKeyes Center for Media and Cultural Freedom.
Muna’s father, Anwar Muna, was quoted by SKeyes as saying that the Israeli forces searched his son’s house, seized his cell phone, and did not state the reason for his son’s arrest.
News reports cited Muna’s brother, Abdel Karim Muna, as saying that the Salem Israeli military court on August 2 extended Muna’s detention for seven days for the purposes of interrogation without providing any further details.
The Salem Court on August 8 extended Muna’s detention for three more days without stating the reasons and on August 12, 2018, he was placed under administrative detention for six months, according to Muna’s father, Muna’s employer and news reports. According to Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, administrative detention is incarceration without trial or charge, alleging that a person plans to commit a future offense. It has no time limit, and the evidence on which it is based is not disclosed, according to B’Tselem.
Heba Baydoun, a senior member of the Palestinian prisoner support group Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, told CPJ in November 2018 that Muna is being held at Meggido Prison in northern Israel and that the Ofer Military Court on September 20 rejected the appeal filed by his lawyer and upheld the decision to remand him in administrative detention.
Muna was previously arrested by Israeli forces in August 2013 and placed in administrative detention until he was released in April 2015, according to SKeyes and Muna’s employer.
As of late 2018, the Israeli Defense Forces had not responded to CPJ’s email requesting comment.