The system in place - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
►http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/04/20134792038694371.html
❝ The arrest of acclaimed musician, Oday Khatib , sheds light on Israel’s draconian system of arrest and detention.
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With thousands of other Palestinians behind bars, Oday’s case is therefore no more or less unfair than thousands of others; it simply sheds new light on the system.
Oday’s family has expressed hope that several of the soldiers who chased the youth on March 19 will be willing to testify that Oday was not among the stone-throwers. Not likely: the conviction rate for such alleged offences in military trials, in 2010, was 99.74 percent.
On Monday, Oday is scheduled to walk into the courtroom of an occupying military power and hear the charges against him. His old teacher - one of dozens who have been lighting up social media sites in the wake of Oday’s arrest - hopes he will sing.
“I imagine the only way he is surviving prison is by singing,” writes Julia Katarina, the British mezzo-soprano who put her opera career on hold for three years to teach voice lessons at Al Kamandjati. “I hope he sings in the military court,” Julia writes, because if Oday’s accusers can find “an ounce of humanity in their hearts, they will release him.”
Sandy Tolan