For the past two years Abdel-Muhti, 57, has been locked up in immigration jails in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. During this time, the cops repeatedly harassed and threatened him, including by putting him in the “hole.” But their efforts to isolate and break him failed, as the Palestinian revolutionary continued to speak out from behind bars and to win international support for his fight to be released.

On April 10 U.S. district judge Yvette Kane ordered the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (BICE) to free him within 10 days. The conditions of his release include reporting regularly to immigration officers, defense committee spokesman David Wilson told the Militant. Back in New York, Abdel-Muhti appeared on WBAI radio the day after his release.

After the judge’s ruling, U.S. marshals flew the Palestinian to the federal prison in Atlanta without the knowledge of his attorneys. For four days he was kept incommunicado, until he was able to make a five-minute phone call and reach members of his defense committee.

Abdel-Muhti, a longtime defender of Palestinian self-determination, was arrested on April 26, 2002, by immigration and FBI cops who claimed they were acting on the basis of a 1995 order to deport him either to Jordan or to Israel. For 250 days he was held in solitary confinement. The Committee for the Release of Farouk Abdel-Muhti organized protests and a petitioning campaign for his release.

The judge’s decision to order his release centered on whether he was deportable in the “foreseeable future.” In an earlier case the Supreme Court set six months as a “reasonable” time for the government to carry out a deportation order after appeals are exhausted. If that is not possible, the government is required to provide a reason to continue to keep them in jail. Failing that, they must be released subject to conditions.

The judge rejected the government’s argument that Abdel-Muhti should remain in an jail because he had supposedly refused to cooperate with the government to establish his identity or obtain travel documents from Israel, Jordan, or the Palestinian National Authority. He had “made a good faith effort” with the government’s requests, she said.

Abdel-Muhti was born in 1947 in the West Bank town of Ramallah, which at the time was ruled by the United Kingdom under a United Nations mandate. Because he left the West Bank before the Israeli occupation began in 1967, he cannot obtain travel documents from the Palestinian National Authority, Jordan, or Israel.

The defense committee is planning to celebrate the release on April 26, the second anniversary of Abdel-Muhti’s arrest. The committee can be contacted at (212) 674-9499; e-mail freefarouk@yahoo.com.  
 
 
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