Tunis, Tunisia – For nine-year-old Yassar Naouar, visiting his father in prison has become an exercise in staying strong. He tries not to cry in front of Wael, fearing that seeing his son in tears would make an already painful situation harder for him. After leaving the prison, Yassar finds a corner where he can finally let the tears fall.
Hichem Naouar, Yassar’s grandfather, says the boy has changed since his father was detained. He now sleeps beside his mother after waking up screaming at night and his results at school have worsened. When Yassar told his mother that other children kept asking whether his father was a thief, she asked him what he thought.
“Never,” the nine-year-old replied.
Wael’s youngest child, four-year-old Sumud, is too young to understand why her father is in prison. Hichem says he took her to visit him. When she saw her father behind the glass, she leaned forward to embrace him, only to hit her head against the barrier.
Hichem spoke to Al Jazeera on Wednesday outside the Tunis Court of Appeal, where he had gone to follow the latest challenge to Wael’s detention. He repeatedly choked up as he described what he had seen during his most recent visit.
Wael was sitting with his hand against his cheek, his father said, his elbow trembling and his gaze fixed in the distance. He was struggling to see clearly and to keep water down without vomiting. He was dizzy and had difficulty controlling his left leg. Wael later told Hichem that other prisoners had said he sometimes wakes during the night calling out his youngest daughter’s name.
For his father, however, Wael’s story is also about the kind of person he has been. He recalled an incident during the Sumud land convoy in Libya in May, when armed men tried to kidnap another participant. Wael intervened, pulled the man away and helped him escape before returning to the men and telling them they could take him instead.
During the first Sumud flotilla, a female fell into the sea and was close to drowning. Wael immediately jumped in and rescued her.
“Wael’s strength is in the strength of his ideas and in his commitment to his people. Whenever he heard about any injustice against workers or employees, you would always find him at the forefront,” Hichem said.
Wael, 41, began a hunger strike on August 16 to protest his continued detention and was transferred to hospital as his condition deteriorated. He suspended his strike after 38 days following appeals from his lawyers and supporters, saying the decision did not mean abandoning his demands.
Four activists, Wael Naouar, Ghassan Henchiri, Ghassan Boughdiri and Nabil Channoufi, have been held since March following an investigation by Tunisia’s Economic and Financial Judicial Pole, a specialised body that handles financial and economic crimes. The investigation concerns alleged financial irregularities linked to fundraising for the Global Sumud Flotilla, an international campaign seeking to deliver aid to Gaza and challenge Israel’s blockade of the Palestinian territory.
The state-owned TAP news agency, citing judicial sources, reported that investigators are examining the origin and use of funds collected for the flotilla and whether any were diverted for other purposes. The activists and their defence team have repeatedly denied wrongdoing and maintain their innocence. None of the four has been convicted.
The fallout has also widened beyond the four men. Fourteen people detained after the September 19 protest calling for their release have since been placed in pretrial detention, lawyer Rafed Rabbeh confirmed to Al Jazeera on Friday. Among them is a 17-year-old who was brought before a juvenile judge. Tunisia’s Child Protection Code says priority should be given to preventive and educational measures and that pretrial detention should be avoided as much as possible for children.
Rabbeh said the detainees face several charges, including participating in a gathering allegedly intended to disturb public order and commit an offence, publicly attributing unlawful acts to a public official without proof, and making public statements deemed to damage the reputation of a person or official body. The charges are based on several provisions of Tunisia’s Penal Code.
Speaking by phone from Gafsa, Ghassan Henchiri’s father, Sebti, said his son remains conscious but is visibly exhausted after being on hunger strike since September 9.
“According to what his sister told me after visiting him, he is still holding up. The fatigue is visible. He is exhausted, but he is still conscious,” Sebti said.
Ghassan’s detention has also reshaped family life. He had been working at a high school and was recently engaged, Sebti said.
He described Ghassan’s political commitment as something rooted in the family. He has been involved in student activism and later trade unions since 1978, campaigning for freedom, the right to organise and a better, more dignified life for Tunisians. Ghassan grew up with those principles and was influenced by his father’s activism.
“This is what Ghassan was raised on and what influenced him,” Sebti said.
Human Rights Watch has also raised concerns over the use of financial and money-laundering investigations against civil society actors in Tunisia.
For the Naouar and Henchiri families, the impact of the detentions is being felt at home, in prison visits, anxious phone calls and children asking when their fathers will return.”
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Source: Al Jazeera Africa
