The Israel Film & Television Directors Guild, which represents the vast majority of the country’s film professionals, has urged Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant to cancel the detention without charges of filmmaker Avraham Shapira, who was arrested while working on a documentary exposing alleged injustices of the Israel Security Agency.
Shapira, a father of four from Yitzhar in Samaria, was arrested on Aug. 22 and put in administrative detention on the orders of Gallant and the ISA, Channel 14 News revealed last week.
Shapira was working on “an investigation about the activities of the ISA in the 1990s, including embarrassing affairs for the ISA such as the use of instigator agents, the use of [undercover ISA operative] Avishai Raviv among the settlers and other stories that will shake the country,” his lawyer said, echoing accusations that the agency, the Israeli equivalent to the FBI, was partially responsible for the murder of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
In a Sept. 11 letter addressed to Gallant, Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara and Defense Ministry legal adviser Itay Ofir, the Film & Television Directors Guild explained that administrative detention orders targeting citizens are an “unusual and extreme tool in democratic countries, all the more so when it concerns detention that could be related to freedom of expression and criticism of the body that carried out the arrest.”
The letter was co-signed by the Israel Documentary Forum.
“Freedom of creation and expression are the foundations of democracy, even when the expression is not to the liking of one or another security or government body,” the organizations continued. The missive urged Gallant to “act according to a legal procedure, which includes the investigation of the facts,” and cancel Shapira’s detention.
“No citizen is above the law. On the other hand, in a democratic country, security and law enforcement agencies have no right to override the law, and freedom of expression and the right to artistic freedom within the law must be protected,” the guide concluded.
Responding to criticism last week, the ISA issued a statement claiming Shapira is a “violent and extreme activist involved in directing hilltop youth and young men to carry out violent activities” in Samaria.
“Shapira was arrested as part of a police investigation on suspicions that he took part in the terrorist events in Kfar Jit on Aug. 15, during which a Palestinian was murdered and four houses were set on fire,” according to the ISA. Jit is five miles northwest of Yitzhar, south of Nablus.
“He did not cooperate, and in the absence of a criminal [prosecution] alternative, it was decided to put him under administrative arrest due to the great danger of his continued activity,” the agency said. “The false claim that Shapira was arrested for being a ‘film director’ is unfounded.”
Jerusalem asserts that administrative detention is necessary to prevent attacks or to detain dangerous terror suspects without sharing evidence that could endanger vital intelligence sources. Since Gallant took office in December 2022, the use of administrative detention against Jewish Israelis has reached an all-time high, right-wing groups have claimed.
