Cageprisoners.com
17th July 2004, 08:53 PM
In the first week of July 2004, 28-year old Briton Tahira Tabassum was acquitted of all charges after being arrested for failure to notify the authorities on the activities of her husband, 27-year old Briton Omar Sharif who drowned near Tel Aviv in April 2003 after an alleged suicide bombing in a Tel Aviv cafe.
When news of her husband's alleged involvement in the above bombing broke, Tahira Tabassum, the mother of three children, the youngest of which she had just given birth to two months prior, was arrested by British Anti-Terrorist Police and charged with failure to disclose information about a terrorist attack.
She was kept in solitary confinement for 22 hours a day in Belmarsh Prison in South East London. In a recent interview to The Guardian on 09 July 2004, she said:
"I can't tell you how low I was feeling," she says. "I was in a cell for 22 hours, I needed support, I needed my family around me, I was constantly crying."
Two months earlier she had given birth to her third child, whom she had been breastfeeding. "At that time I needed help and support but I was in prison. I was feeling very low, I was taken away from my children, I'd lost my husband, it was totally unfair."
British authorities, over their failure to prevent British citizens allegedly participating in such bombings, instead tried to cover up by making the wife of one of the alleged participants pay, in much the same way as Israeli forces bulldoze the homes of alleged Palestinian 'suicide bombers' to make their families pay over what they do.
In a show trial that lasted several weeks, a jury found Tahira Tabassum not guilty of the charges.
It is interesting to note that of the hundreds of British citizens who travel to Israel each year, undertake military training and participate in terrorist attacks against Palestinian civilians, not a single one has ever been prosecuted in British courts, let alone prosecuting their family members.
Tahira Tabassum, the now single mother of three children, is now trying to rebuild her life after her mistreatment at the hands of British authorities. Send her a message of support on the Caegeprisoners forum (http://forums.cageprisoners.com/showthread.php?p=2312#post2312) and Cageprisoners.com will endeavour to ensure that she reads them.
When news of her husband's alleged involvement in the above bombing broke, Tahira Tabassum, the mother of three children, the youngest of which she had just given birth to two months prior, was arrested by British Anti-Terrorist Police and charged with failure to disclose information about a terrorist attack.
She was kept in solitary confinement for 22 hours a day in Belmarsh Prison in South East London. In a recent interview to The Guardian on 09 July 2004, she said:
"I can't tell you how low I was feeling," she says. "I was in a cell for 22 hours, I needed support, I needed my family around me, I was constantly crying."
Two months earlier she had given birth to her third child, whom she had been breastfeeding. "At that time I needed help and support but I was in prison. I was feeling very low, I was taken away from my children, I'd lost my husband, it was totally unfair."
British authorities, over their failure to prevent British citizens allegedly participating in such bombings, instead tried to cover up by making the wife of one of the alleged participants pay, in much the same way as Israeli forces bulldoze the homes of alleged Palestinian 'suicide bombers' to make their families pay over what they do.
In a show trial that lasted several weeks, a jury found Tahira Tabassum not guilty of the charges.
It is interesting to note that of the hundreds of British citizens who travel to Israel each year, undertake military training and participate in terrorist attacks against Palestinian civilians, not a single one has ever been prosecuted in British courts, let alone prosecuting their family members.
Tahira Tabassum, the now single mother of three children, is now trying to rebuild her life after her mistreatment at the hands of British authorities. Send her a message of support on the Caegeprisoners forum (http://forums.cageprisoners.com/showthread.php?p=2312#post2312) and Cageprisoners.com will endeavour to ensure that she reads them.