November 21, 2002

Amer Jubran Defense Committee
P.O. Box 755, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130

For further information, contact Scott Cooper at 617-964-8029

Detained Palestine Activist Released on Bond;
International Campaign Victorious

Palestinian human rights activist Amer Jubran was released this
afternoon from the custody of the U.S. Immigration &
Naturalization Service after 17 days in illegal detention. At a
morning bond hearing, INS Judge Shapiro stated that he saw "no
reason" not to grant the request for bond. The government's
attorney, while asking for a hearing on an immigration
technicality now scheduled for Feb. 20, 2003, raised no
objection and deferred to the judge's decision.

Jubran walked out of the INS office in Providence, Rhode Island,
after being incarcerated in ACI Cranston since Nov. 4, in the
early afternoon.

Jubran's release comes after a concerted international campaign
that compelled the INS first to agree to set a bond hearing and
then not to contest the setting of bond. The Boston INS office
of District Director Steven J. Farquharson has been deluged with
hundreds of letters and faxes from ordinary citizens across the
United States and the world. In addition, dozens of prominent
people, including members of several European parliaments, a
Nobel laureate, and noted jurists in France and Spain have
demanded Jubran's release.

Upon his release at the INS office in Rhode Island, Jubran
stated: "All of this is part and parcel of the roundup of Arabs
and the attempt to chill all voices of dissent. Nothing new
happened here. But this effort to silence the voices of those of
us seeking justice for Palestine will not succeed. There are
hundreds of Amer Jubrans - men and women, white and Black, Jews
and Muslims - who will continue to come forward until Palestine
is free."

Jubran was detained on Nov. 4, after FBI and INS agents entered
his Cumberland, Rhode Island home. Jubran had led a legal march
and rally in Boston only two days earlier commemorating the 85th
anniversary of the Balfour Declaration. He was held and
threatened with "indefinite detention" after refusing to answer
questions in an FBI interrogation because he did not have a
lawyer present.

The courtroom and hallway on the 3rd floor of the JFK Federal
Building in Boston was packed today, as dozens of Jubran's
supporters entered the building to show their solidarity and
demand his release. Others picketed outside. A cheer went up in
the building when the news got out of the courtroom that the
judge had set bond, and that Jubran would be released today.

The Amer Jubran Defense Committee has consistently characterized
the detention of Amer Jubran as a politically motivated attack
on free speech and legal activism. It is the local face of
"homeland security," and threatens the civil liberties and
constitutional guarantees of all. While the government today
offered the pretext that Jubran's detention was because of an
immigration technicality, it is clear from the extended
detention that this is an ongoing effort to silence those who
speak out loudly for the rights of Palestinians to resist
oppression. The next task is to bring an end to the continued
prosecution of this matter.