MIDDLE EAST: Israel has released a Palestinian photographer who works for the French news agency Agence France-Presse after jailing him without charge for nearly six months.
"I'm OK. I'm very happy to see my family," Mr Hussam Abu Alan said after he was dropped off by the army at a military checkpoint outside Hebron, the West Bank city where he lives.
Mr Abu Alan (47) was detained on April 24th at a checkpoint north of Hebron when he tried to reach a nearby village to cover the funeral of militants killed by Israeli forces during the now two-year-old Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.
He was handcuffed, blindfolded and eventually taken to the Ofer detention camp near the West Bank city of Ramallah. He was later moved to a detention camp in the Negev desert.
Mr Abu Alan was released one week after Mr Jussry al-Jamal, a Reuters cameraman from Hebron, who spent more than five months in detention at Ofer.
Israeli officials accused the two of having contacts with militant groups but did not press any formal charges. They never made public any details or evidence supporting the allegations, which the journalists denied.
They were held with hundreds of Palestinians in crowded tents under conditions that human rights groups say are deplorable.
Mr Daniel Seaman, head of the Government Press Office, said their detentions "had nothing to do with the fact that [the prisoners\] were journalists".
Israel says its widespread detentions and measures intended to rein in militants are justified in its efforts to quell the uprising, which has been spearheaded by Palestinian suicide bombers. - (Reuters)