Thursday, February 13, 2014

  • Thursday, February 13, 2014
  • Elder of Ziyon
From Al Arabiya:
A Lebanese web developer has been sentenced to two months in prison for insulting President Michel Sleiman on Twitter, a judicial source told AFP.

"Jean Assy was sentenced to two months in jail for defaming and insulting the president via Twitter," the source said.

"The court decision can be appealed within 10 days."

The case is thought to be the first time a Lebanese citizen has been sentenced for views expressed on a social network, though people have previously been charged for similar insults.

Assy said the case stemmed from tweets he wrote about Sleiman in January and February of last year.

"I wrote that the president is castrated, politically castrated, and I wrote the minister of interior is stupid, and things like this," he told AFP.

He has not yet been arrested and said he plans to appeal the decision.

"I'm not going to spend two months in jail because of a tweet. I'm going to fight it, I'm not going to allow him to punish someone who tweeted against him while he is ignoring all the problems in the country," Assy said of Sleiman.

Assy, 26, has nearly 6,000 followers and regularly tweets harsh and at times vulgar criticism of many of Lebanon's politicians.

He says he is not a political activist, but acknowledges his support for Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah and his Christian ally Michel Aoun, who are spared his online wrath.
Yes, Lebanon's liberals are just as intolerant as Hezbollah is.


Here is what Human Rights Watch said:
The verdict was immediately criticized by Human Rights Watch, whose deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa called it a "negative development."

"Criminalizing and sending someone to jail for expression that someone deems insulting or inflammatory violates Lebanon's international obligations to protect expression," Nadim Houry told AFP.

"Lebanon has a decision to make," he added.

"Does it want to go down the route of so many other countries in the region... or does it want to preserve and maintain its reputation for a great tolerance for free expression in the Arab world?"
When Lebanon does something outrageously against human rights, HRW still compliments it. Can you imagine them sugarcoating any criticism of Israel, for any reason?

I really should do a comparison between how Lebanon treats Palestinian Arabs and how Israel does - and then compare how many NGO reports are written about each.



AddToAny

EoZ Book:"Protocols: Exposing Modern Antisemitism"

Printfriendly

EoZTV Podcast

Podcast URL

Subscribe in podnovaSubscribe with FeedlyAdd to netvibes
addtomyyahoo4Subscribe with SubToMe

search eoz

comments

Speaking

translate

E-Book

For $18 donation








Sample Text

EoZ's Most Popular Posts in recent years

Hasbys!

Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون



This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For over 19 years and 40,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

Donate!

Donate to fight for Israel!

Monthly subscription:
Payment options


One time donation:

subscribe via email

Follow EoZ on Twitter!

Interesting Blogs

Blog Archive