Khalida Jarrar (; born 9 February 1963) is a Palestinian politician.David Hearst, 'INTERVIEW: Palestinian lawmaker Khalida Jarrar ,' Middle East Eye 2 April 2015 She is a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC). She was elected to the PLC in January 2006 as one of the PFLP's three deputiesMichael Bröning, Political Parties in Palestine: Leadership and Thought, Palgrave 2013 pp.108-112 (interview) p.102. and has continued to serve as an elected representative ever since. She is also the Palestinian representative on the Council of Europe and is currently head of the Prisoners Committee of the PLC.'58 MEPs address letter to HR/VP Mogherini concerning arrest of PLC member Khalida Jarrar,' GUE/NGL 14 April 2015. She played a major role in Palestine's application to join the International Criminal Court.
She has been arrested multiple times by the Israeli authorities. Several of these arrests resulted in administrative detention without any charges being brought. She has also been charged with "incitement and involvement in terror" by an Israeli military court. The incitement charge refers to public statements she made in 2012 in which she criticized the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Born Without Civil Rights Israel’s Use of Draconian Military Orders to Repress Palestinians in the West Bank Human Rights Watch 17 December 2019 The court sentenced her to 15 months in prison, of which she served 6, before being released after an international campaign on her behalf.
In March 2021, after having been held without charge since 2019, she was sentenced by an Israeli military court to two years in prison after a plea bargain, in which she declared herself guilty of membership in an organization, the PFLP, which Israel regards as a terrorist group. She went on record to state that her plea bargaining was due to the exhaustingly protracted nature of legal proceedings, lack of faith in Israel's military courts, and the threat of a 7-year sentence. She was released on 26 September 2021. She was rearrested in December 2023, following the outbreak of the Gaza war, and released in January 2025 as part of the 2025 Gaza war ceasefire.Gideon Levy, 'For a Bit of Air, the Palestinian Lawmaker Lies Down on the Floor, by the Crack Under the Cell Door,' Haaretz 30 August 2024
Family Jarrar's father ran a toy-shop business in Nablus. In 1985, after a five-year engagement, and when she had completed her master's degree at Bir Zeit, Jarrar married Ghassan Jarrar, a fellow student, and now a manufacturer of children's furniture and toys at Beit Furik, a former political activist who has been arrested 14 times and spent 10–11 years without trial or charges being laid under administrative detention in Israeli prisons. The couple had three children: Yafa, with a degree in law from the University of Ottawa; Suha, with a master's of science degree in climate change science and policy; who grew up thinking soldiers pounding on one's doors, arrests and the imprisonment of parents was a normal part of children's lives;Gideon Levy and Alex Levac,'A rare moment of humanity in an Israeli military court,' Haaretz, 27 June 2015. and a son, Wadia. The couple live in al-Bireh, Ramallah.Charlotte Kates, 'She Speaks the Truth':Palestinian leftist parliamentarian Khalida Jarrar arrested in early-morning Israeli raid Israel/Palestine,' Mondoweiss, April 2, 2015'Israel arrests Palestinian lawmaker,' The Times of Israel 2 April 2015.Naela Khalil,'Israel arrests Palestinian MP in pre-dawn raid,' Al-Araby, 2 April 2015. In her six years of imprisonment, she has been refused leave to attend her father's funeral (2015), that of her mother (2018), and of her daughter Suha (2021) who died aged 31. On Suha's death from cardiac arrest in July 2021, Jarrar was denied a temporary release from her imprisonment on humanitarian grounds in order to attend her daughter's funeral.Jack Khoury, 'Israel Bars Jailed Palestinian Lawmaker From Attending Daughter's Funeral,' Haaretz 12 July 2021 Her son Wadia died in 2024, aged 29, also of a heart attack while she was again under administrative detention.
Career Jarrar has been a human rights activist for many years. Her first of several arrests began on 8 March 1989 when she was detained for participating in a demonstration on International Women’s Day.Amira Hass 'Israel’s Release of Palestinian Lawmaker Lets Her Forget the Larger Prison for a Moment,' Haaretz 9 March 2019. She has been active for a number of years in support of Palestinian prisoners, and she served as the director of Addameer, a prisoners' support and human rights NGO in Ramallah,Adam Horowitz, Lizzy Ratner, Philip Weiss, Desmond Tutu, The Goldstone Report: The Legacy of the Landmark Investigation of the Gaza Conflict, Nation Books, 2011 pp.251-2. from 1993 to 2005 and remains a board member. She has also previously worked with UNRWA and has been prominently active in working with Palestinian women and advocating for women's rights.'Israel arrests leftist lawmaker Khalida Jarrar,' Middle East Eye 2 April 2015.
Since 1998 Jarrar has been banned from traveling outside of the occupied Palestinian territories, after she attended the Human Rights Defenders' Summit in Paris that year. In 2005 the Israeli authorities refused to allow her to leave the country, the 6th such refusal since 2000, to attend a human rights conference in Ireland organized by Front Line Defenders, namely the "Third Dublin Platform for Human Rights Defenders", programmed to take place in Dublin in October 2005. At the time, she had never been charged with any criminal offence by the Israeli authorities.Hina Jilani, 'Promotion and Protection of Human Rights: Human Rights Defenders,' Report of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General, E/CN.4/2006/95/Add.1 22 March 2006. Since March 2006, she has been the PFLP's senior political leader, after the group's Secretary General Ahmad Sa'adat was arrested and placed in solitary confinement.
She was interviewed for the Goldstone Report by telephone in 2009 on the Gaza War (2008–09), after she was denied permission to leave the West Bank.
Health Jarrar has suffered from bouts of deep vein thrombosis, and her lawyer has expressed concern that appropriate medical care for her condition might not be available in an Israeli prison.'Lawyer: Israel to detain Palestinian MP for six months,' Al Jazeera 6 April 2015. In July 2010, Jarrar was informed by a doctor that tests indicated she needed an urgent brain scan to establish an exact neurological diagnosis. Since the medical equipment to make the diagnosis was not available in the West Bank, where she was then detained, she was informed that the PNA's Health Ministry would cover the costs of her hospitalization in Amman, but not in Israel. As a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, expatriation for medical tests should, she was assured, could be arranged. An Israeli official for the Civil Administration of the West Bank said there was no security threat were she to be treated in Jordan. On August 29, she was denied transit to Jordan via the Allenby Bridge, and Shin Bet stated that she was a security threat to the region. Former European Parliament vice president Luisa Morgantini called on the European Parliament to intervene by requesting that Israel allow Jarrar to go to Amman for the necessary medical treatment.'EU official: Israel denying lawmaker access to hospital,' Ma'an News Agency 20 September 2010. Subsequently, she was allowed, later that year, to travel to Amman for treatment.
Expulsion order On 20 August 2014, approximately 50 Israeli soldiers surrounded Jarrar's home in Ramallah, and an Israeli officer gave her an expulsion order stating she was a threat to the security of the region and was to leave her home of residence, Ramallah, and transfer to the district of Jericho where she was to live under a restricted movement protocol for six months. The order was to be considered immediately effective. She rejected the order, stating: "it is the occupation who must leave our homeland." Ramallah, according to the Oslo Accords, is located in Area A, and under complete Palestinian jurisdiction. Jarrar refused to sign the order.'Urgent Appeal: Palestinian Legislative Council Member Khalida Jarrar Expelled to Jericho,' Addameer org. 20 August 2014.
Jarrar made an appeal against the decision to an Israeli court, which reduced the restriction period from 6 to 1 month.'Press Briefing,' Human Rights Council, United Nations Office at Geneva (UNOG) 10 April 2015. But Jarrar actually never left Ramallah. According to a left-wing columnist of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, her refusal to be deported lead to her arrest in April 2015.
Administrative detention, trial and conviction
On 2 April 2015, at around 1:15 a.m., Jarrar was arrested at her home by Israeli soldiers. Her husband says that a unit of 50–60 soldiers smashed the front gate and broke into the house,Creede Newton, 'Palestinian legislator arrested in West Bank,' Al Jazeera 2 April 2015. but otherwise did not act violently. No reason was given him for the arrest, though a commander, a Captain Yihye, said she had flouted an earlier army order to leave her home. Soldiers tried to prevent the husband and wife from embracing as she left, but Yihye intervened to allow them to do so. One of their daughters was found by her father bound by plastic handcuffs, after Khalida was taken away. According to the arrest warrant, Jarrar was involved in 'incitement and involvement in terror.' She was incarcerated in HaSharon prison.Gideon Levy, Alex Levac, 'My wife, the jailed Palestinian MP' , Haaretz 24 April 2015. Two computers and a mobile phone were confiscated. A six-month administrative detention, which can be renewed indefinitely, was issued against her by Central Command Chief Gen. Roni Numa and was reviewed by a military court on April 8,'PA lawmaker sent to six months in jail without trial,' The Times of Israel, 6 April 2015 where it was confirmed, despite international protests. Her detention without trial was condemned by Israel's Haaretz newspaper, which argued that Israel at times adopts the procedure excessively.Haaretz Editorial, 'Israel is punishing Palestinian activist through vindictive administrative detention,' , Haaretz, 7 April 2015:'International conventions do not prohibit administrative detentions, but restrict their use to extremely irregular cases, due to the harsh infringement of civil and prisoners’ rights involved. Israel interprets this restriction too liberally and sometimes makes excessive use of the detentions, without letting the public know whether there is any justification for them..' Though international humanitarian law does accept administrative detention in exceptional cases and only as a last resort,Michele de Carlo,'Indefinite jail without trial? That's Israeli justice,' Al-Araby, 13 April 2015:'B'Tselem, the Israeli information centre for human rights, said: "International law stipulates that it may be exercised only in very exceptional cases - and then only as a last possible resort, when there are no other available means - to prevent the danger." human rights groups argue that Israel, which claims the detentions thwart militant attacks, exceeds the limits by its extensive recourse to the practice.Associated Press, 'Israel to detain female Palestinian lawmaker for 6 months, lawyer says,' Ynet 6 April 2015.