On April 18, Israeli police arrested Professor Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, a renowned Palestinian scholar and my former academic supervisor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. They kept her in detention overnight — in conditions designed to break her spirit, like other Palestinian political prisoners — before a court ordered her release, rejecting the police’s demand to extend her time behind bars. The arrest and ensuing interrogations are the latest phase in the Israeli authorities’ crusade against the professor, who is a vocal advocate of Palestinian rights and an outspoken critic of Zionism.
Shalhoub-Kevorkian’s incarceration was clearly intended to be as cruel and dehumanizing as possible. According to her family, police officers raided her house in the Old City of Jerusalem without warning, searching and confiscating her books, papers, notes, and interview transcripts. During her interrogation and detention, the officers subjected the 64-year-old to ill-treatment and practices that amount to forms of torture: she was strip-searched, yelled and cursed at, and thrown in a cold, isolated, and urine-smelling cell infested with cockroaches; the cell was kept illuminated throughout the night with bright, buzzing lights to prevent her from sleeping; and for some of the time her hands and feet were shackled…..more
