ISRAELI and Palestinian human rights groups have joined forces to demand the release of a leading Palestinian human rights activist, Dr Iyad Saraj, who is being held without charge by Mr Yasser Arafat's security forces.
Mr Saraj apparently is being held for issuing a barrage of criticism of Mr Arafat's rule.
In the latest example of Mr Arafat's heavy handed treatment of those Palestinians who dare question his regime, Dr Saraj, who heads both a Gaza mental health centre and a human rights watchdog group, was arrested on Saturday in Gaza City and remained in custody last night.
The attorney general of the Palestinian Authority, Mr Khaled Kidreh, said that Dr Saraj's unspecified alleged violations would be swiftly investigated, and that a decision would be taken soon about whether to press charges.
Dr Saraj, who was briefly detained last December for complaining about the abuse of Palestinian prisoners by Mr Arafat's authority, appears to have fallen foul of the authority this time because of a remarkably strong worded indictment of Mr Arafat's rule he delivered in an interview with the New York Times on May 6th.
In that interview, he described the administration as corrupt, dictatorial and repressive, and said Palestinians had enjoyed a greater sense of freedom when Israel was the occupying power.
He added that torture of detainees was routine and systematic, and that prisoners were often killed or crippled while in detention.
B'Tselem, the leading independent Israeli human rights group has written to Mr Arafat, echoing Palestinian groups' demands for Dr Saraj's release.
In recent months, Mr Arafat's forces have detained other human rights activists, jailed newspaper editors, and been charged by watchdog groups with torturing prisoners.
In an incident that made headlines here last week Fayez Noureddin, a news agency photographer, was detained for 10 hours, and kicked and beaten by Mr Arafat's agents who accused him of showing a negative image of Palestinians in his photography.
The picture that gave offence shows Gaza youngsters washing a donkey and a sheep in shallow water on a Gaza beach.