Golan Heights correspondent freed on competing three-year jail sentence

Reporters Without Borders has learned that Atta Farhat, the Golan Heights correspondent of Syrian public television and the Syrian national daily Al Watani, was released on 2 August on completing a three-year jail sentence. Arrested at his home in the Golan Heights town of Buqata on 30 July 2007 after covering a peaceful demonstration calling on Israel and Syria to seek peace, he was convicted of “communicating with a hostile country.” Israel annexed the Golan Heights in 1981. ------ 03.08.2010 - Review board refuses to commute Syrian journalist’s jail sentence Reporters Without Borders regrets that the Israeli authorities have rejected a request for Syrian journalist Atta Farhat’s sentence to be commuted. The Golan Heights-based journalist’s lawyers submitted the request at the end of June. Held since July 2007 and serving a three-year jail sentence on a charge of “communicating with a hostile country,” Farhat appeared before a judicial review board on 1 July. Under Israeli law, a prisoner can be granted early release after serving two thirds of his sentence. Giving its reasons for rejecting the request, the board said Farhat was first jailed in 2002 and was detained several times since then. -------- 1st July 2009 - Golan Heights-based Syrian journalist asks panel to commute three-year sentence
Reporters Without Borders reiterates its appeal to the Israeli authorities to be lenient with Syrian journalist Atta Farhat, who is serving a three-year jail sentence on a charge of “communicating with a hostile country.” Detained for nearly two years, he is due to appear today before a judicial review board that could commute his sentence. The Golan Heights correspondent of Syrian public television and the national daily Al Watan, Farhat was arrested at his home in the Golan Heights town of Buq’ata on 30 July 2007 after covering a peaceful demonstration there by Israeli activists calling on Israel and Syria to seek peace. “This has become a political case between Israel and Syria, two countries that have been at war for years, and involves issues that go far beyond Farhat the individual,” Reporters Without Borders said. “A journalist should not be made to pay for the hostilities between two countries, and in particular, their dispute over the Golan Heights, annexed by Israel in 1981.” The press freedom organisation added: “We urge the judicial review board to approve his request for his sentence to be commuted. It is unworthy of a democratic country such as Israel to make someone spend three years in prison for photographing a peaceful demonstration.” Farhat’s trial began behind closed doors on 2 March 2008 amid a court-ordered gag on any reporting about the case. After many hearings, he was finally sentenced on 1 February 2009 to three years in prison and a fine of 25,000 shekels (4,500 euros). He was also given an additional, suspended three-year prison sentence. The Israeli high court rejected two appeals in the case on 10 June – one by the attorney general and one by Farhat’s lawyer.