Solidarity with Ali Abunimah

Tempest encourages our readers and supporters to sign the petition calling for solidarity with, and the release from detention of, Palestinian activist Ali Abunimah. The arrest and attempted deportation of Abunimah, by the Swiss government,  is part of a broader assault on everyone struggling for the liberation of Pallestine, everyone who has fought to call attention to the genocide in Gaza and the complicity of the imperial enablers of Zionism. This is an issue of basic democratic rights which must be consistently defended. 

The Issue

Award-winning Palestinian-American journalist and human rights defender Ali Abunimah, executive director of the media platform “Electronic Intifada,” was violently and forcibly taken by unidentified individuals in civilian clothing while walking on the streets of Zurich on Saturday 25th January 2025. He is now held in administrative detention by the Zurich cantonal police who intend to deport him out of the country on Monday.

He was on his way to give a lecture on the history of Palestine after another event he was going to deliver the following day was cancelled due to external pressure, following a defamatory article in a local newspaper baselessly accusing him of radical Islamism and antisemitism. The cantonal police supposedly obtained a prohibition for him to enter the territory once he was already in the country, a decision which was not subjected to any legal review. Ali Abunimah was brutally abducted in violation of due process.

Ali Abunimah has not been convicted of any crime by Swiss authorities, who have acted on baseless, defamatory accusations to repress free speech and prevent Ali from participating in the events.

This is not only an attempt to silence Ali Abunimah as an individual, but the manifestation of a wider campaign of repressing and intimidating those who dare speak up for for Palestinian human rights and against their genocide, fitting into a pattern of racism and islamophobia. A campaign by special interest groups and powerful institutions to silence the truth and deny the oppression of the Palestinian people, attacking free speech and waging a war on journalism.

We denounce these repressive tendencies and human rights violations and demand from the Swiss authorities:

• the immediate release of Ali Abunimah from administrative detention by the Cantonal Police of Zurich;
• the withdrawal of the prohibition of him entering the country that was issued by the Swiss Fedpol without any valid legal basis;
• an apology and reparations by all relevant Swiss authorities to Ali Abunimah for arbitrarily detaining him;
• an investigation into the procedure that led to this faulty decision by Fedpol and the Cantonal police leading to accountability for those responsible;
• the strict compliance with human rights standards and in particular the guarantee to freedom of expression in Switzerland and an end to State repression of free speech.

Make sure to verify your email after signing the petition and to share it widely: it will be sent to relevant authorities by the end of next week.

For further action, send an email demanding Ali’s release to the Department of Security of the canton of Zurich: ds@ds.zh.ch and read more info about the case on www.swissactionforhumanrights.org/news

Featured Image Credits: Image by Hossam el-Hamalawy.