Aya Khatib, a Palestinian mother of two, begins to serve four years behind Israeli bars for her charity work

The number of Palestinian women freedom fighters in Israeli occupation prisons increased to 37 after Aya Khatib today turned herself in to serve a four-year prison sentence, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS).It said that Khatib, 34, a mother of two, from the town of Arara inside Israel, was transferred today from serving a two-year house arrest to serving an actual four-year prison sentence after the Israeli Haifa District Court found her guilty of collecting funds allegedly ‘to support terrorism and passing them on to Hamas,” according to her lawyer Badr Ighbaria, a charge Khatib has vehemently denied, stressing that the funds she was collecting through her open Facebook page were for charity to help Gaza Strip and West Bank patients getting medical treatment in Israeli hospitals and to help students complete their education.Khatib, who was arrested in February 2020, has been on trial since then and had actually served a year and four months in Damon prison for her charity work before sh
e was sent to house arrest in the village of Basma Tiboun and then in the village of Zulfa, before she was allowed to complete her house arrest in her village Arara.The Haifa court, on August 15 of this year, ruled to have her spend four years in prison, a ruling Khatib described as unjust, which she started to serve today.
Source: Palestine news and Information Agency – WAFA