Israel Arrests Activist Dubbed the ‘Rosa Parks of Palestine’ for Inciting Violence

Tamimi’s arrest comes amid increased efforts to tamp down on support for terrorism in the Jewish state.

AP/Majdi Mohammed
Ahed Tamimi speaks during a press conference on the outskirts of the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh near Ramallah in 2018. AP/Majdi Mohammed

A Palestinian activist and honorary member of the Palestinian Governmental Council, Ahed Tamimi, has been detained by Israel for inciting violence after posting antisemitic threats on social media.

“We will slaughter you and you will say that what Hitler did to you was a joke,” Ms. Tamimi wrote on a since-deleted Instagram post. “We will drink your blood and we will eat your skulls. Come on, let’s go, we’re waiting for you.”

On Monday morning, the activist once dubbed the “Rosa Parks of Palestine” had been “been transferred to Israeli security forces for further questioning,” according to an Israeli Defense Forces spokesman.

“Ehad Tamimi Manbi Saleh, who was previously convicted of attacking IDF soldiers and since the outbreak of the war has expressed sympathy and support for the Nazi human beings on social media,” Israel’s minister of national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, said on Facebook. “Zero tolerance with terrorists and supporters of terrorism! Just like that!” Mr. Ben Gvir posted a photo of Ms. Tamimi in handcuffs along with the statement. 

Ms. Tamimi received international attention for a series of videos in which she attacked IDF soldiers near her village, Nabi Saleh, in the West Bank. An international firestorm ignited after she was arrested for slapping an Israeli soldier in March 2018 and was convicted by an Israeli military court on four counts of assault. Her eight-month jail sentence was condemned by organizations including Amnesty International and the United Nations, as well as left-wing Israeli activists. 

“Nothing she has done can justify her detention,” Amnesty wrote on X, formerly Twitter, at the time of her 2018 arrest. A late Israeli poet and leftist activist,  Yehonatan Geffen, a nephew of a famed Israeli general, Moshe Dayan, celebrated Ms. Tamimi, championing her, “Like David who slapped Goliath,” and comparing her to “Joan of Arc, Hannah Senesh, and Anne Frank.”

Ms. Tamimi hails from a family long associated with protesting the Israeli government. Her cousin, Ahlam Tamimi, assisted in a 2001 suicide bombing attack at a Sbarro pizzeria at Jerusalem. Ahlam Tamimi was sentenced to life in prison in an Israeli court but was released to Jordan as part of a prisoner exchange. 

Ms. Tamimi’s arrest comes amid increased efforts to tamp down on support for terrorism in the Jewish state and Judea and Samaria. As of last week, 100 Israelis had been arrested for incitement of terror. 

On Thursday, the Israeli minister of the interior, Moshe Arbel, unveiled a proposal that would allow the state to strip citizenship from those who support terrorist groups or incite terror during wartime.


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