Dear Paola,
A Kafka-esque situation is unfolding in Israel. 
Jewish-Israeli activist Ezra Nawi has now spent more than a week detained by the Israeli authorities -- for no apparent crime. A gag order was put on his case, so our allies in Israel couldn’t raise the alarm about his arrest. He was even denied access to a lawyer for four days.
That appalling gag order means our Israeli allies can’t speak out so they’ve turned to us for help. We need to raise our voices, get out the word, and get Ezra out of jail. His detention was recently extended for the second time until Wednesday -- and he may face serious charges after that. So we need your help, Paola.
Democratic rights for Jewish Israelis who speak up against Israel’s human rights abuses are deteriorating, and our allies face a backlash everyday. It still does not come close to the persecution that Palestinian activists face -- inside Israel and in the West Bank, Gaza or East Jerusalem. But it is a clear reminder that Israel’s standards of democracy grow weaker by the day.
An Israeli friend (who must remain anonymous because of the gag order) wrote this:
Having denied Palestinians under Occupation their rights to any form of political protest, the Israeli government is now in the process of doing the same to Israeli citizens who support the Palestinian cause. Last week the Israeli police arrested Ezra Nawi, our friend and prominent dissident, who has been indispensable [1] in the struggle for the survival of Palestinian communities in the South Hebron Hills.
This arrest is not an isolated incident but the latest in an orchestrated campaign against dissenting voices supporting Palestinian rights. In recent months the Israeli government has taken new steps to demonize, deny funding access, and now literally threaten with imprisonment, those of us who oppose its criminal policies [2,3,4,5]. And while these violations of Nawi’s rights are no more severe than the routine violation of the rights of Palestinians in countless ways, they do however signal a new stage in Israel’s practice of violently crushing dissent and resistance.
Let the Israeli government know that we will not stand idly by as dissent is suppressed -- on either side of the Green Line. Let the Israeli government know that we’re watching. Let the Israeli government know that we demand an end to the harassment and arrest of activists.
Send a message to the Israeli Embassy: Release Ezra Nawi.
Onward,
Rebecca
Rebecca Vilkomerson
Executive Director
P.S. We just heard that a second Israeli activist has been detained, and there's another gag order in place to try and stop us from raising the alarm. We'll send more details when we have them, but for now -- send a strong message to the Israeli Government, and demand that they free Ezra.
