Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi has been released from prison after serving an eight month sentence for kicking and slapping an Israeli soldier.

While in jail, 17-year-old became the new face of Palestinian resistance, the BBC's Nida Ibrahim reports. </s> Palestinian protest icon Ahed Tamimi released from Israeli prison in jubilant scenes

The teen was arrested after being filmed slapping and kicking Israeli soldiers in front of her home in the occupied West Bank. </s> Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi was released from prison Sunday after serving eight months for slapping two Israeli soldiers, an episode captured on video that made her a symbol of resistance for Palestinians.

Tamimi, 17, and her mother Nariman arrived in their village of Nabi Saleh in the occupied West Bank, where they were met by crowds of supporters and journalists

"The resistance continues until the fall of the occupation, and of course the (female) prisoners in jail are all strong," Ahed Tamimi said, her voice barely audible above the crowd.

"I thank everyone who supported me in this sentence and supports all the prisoners."

Her father Bassem put his arms around Ahed and her mother as they walked together along the road, the crowd chanting "we want to live in freedom".

Tamimi later visited the tomb of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in Ramallah and laid flowers there, before meeting Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas. </s> Israeli prison service says Palestinian protest icon Ahed Tamimi has been released from prison

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli prison service says Palestinian protest icon Ahed Tamimi has been released from prison. </s> Ahed Tamimi, a Palestinian teenager who kicked and slapped an Israeli soldier, is released from prison to euphoric scenes in the West Bank. David Doyle reports.

PALESTINIAN teenager Ahed Tamimi has finally been released from prison.

The controversial activist was greeted by crowds of supporters after serving eight months for slapping Israeli soldiers, an episode that made her a symbol of resistance for Palestinians.

Ms Tamimi, 17, and her mother Nariman, who was also jailed over the incident, arrived in their village of Nabi Saleh in the occupied West Bank, where they were mobbed by journalists.

Easily recognisable by her shock of reddish hair, Ms Tamimi wore a Palestinian-style keffiyeh around her neck, at times appearing relaxed but at other moments overwhelmed as television cameras followed her.

“The resistance continues until the fall of the occupation, and of course the (female) prisoners in jail are all strong,” Ms Tamimi said, her voice barely audible above the crowd.

“I thank everyone who supported me in this sentence and supports all the prisoners.”

Her father Bassem put his arms around the girl and her mother as they walked together along a road, while a crowd of around 100 chanted, “We want to live in freedom.”

At a press conference later at a square in the village, Ms Tamimi sat at a table behind a forest of microphones, a translator providing an English version of her remarks.

She declined to take questions from Israeli journalists because of what she said was unfair coverage of her and her family’s cause.

She said she planned to study law to hold Israel’s occupation accountable.

“Of course I am very happy that I came back to my family, but that happiness is partial, because of the prisoners who are still in prison,” she said.

Ms Tamimi also visited the tomb of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in Ramallah and laid flowers there, before meeting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Israeli authorities appeared keen to avoid media coverage of the release as much as possible, and conflicting information had meant supporters and journalists scrambled to arrive on time at the correct location.

Ms Tamimi and her mother had been driven early on Sunday from Israel’s Sharon Prison into the West Bank, authorities said.

But the location of the checkpoint where they were to cross into the territory was changed three times before it was finally announced they were being taken to a crossing at Rantis, about an hour’s drive from the initial location.

In a sign of the sensitivity of the case, Israeli authorities on Saturday arrested two Italians and a Palestinian for painting Ms Tamimi’s image on the Israeli separation wall cutting off the West Bank.

Both Ms Tamimi and her mother were sentenced to eight months’ jail by an Israeli military court following a plea deal over the December incident, which the family said took place in their garden in Nabi Saleh.

They were released some three weeks early, a common practice by Israeli authorities due to overcrowded prisons, the family’s lawyer Gaby Lasky said.

Video filmed by Ms Tamimi’s mother of the December incident went viral, leading Palestinians to view the teenager as a hero standing up to Israel’s occupation.

But many Israelis believe the teen is being used by her activist family as a pawn in staged provocations.

They point to a series of previous incidents, with older pictures of her confronting soldiers shared widely online.

Many Israelis also praised the restraint of the soldiers, who remained calm throughout, though others said her actions merited a tougher response.

Omar Shakir of Human Rights Watch tweeted on Sunday that “Israel’s jailing of a child for eight months — for calling for protests and slapping a soldier — reflects endemic discrimination, absence of due process and ill-treatment of kids”.

“Ahed Tamimi is free, but 100s of Palestinian children remain locked up with little attention on their cases,” he wrote.

Ms Tamimi was arrested in the early hours of December 19, four days after the incident in the video. She was 16 at the time.

Her mother Nariman was also arrested, as was her cousin Nour, who was freed in March.

Israel’s military said the two soldiers had been in the area on the day of the incident to prevent Palestinians from throwing stones at Israeli motorists.

The video shows the cousins approaching them and telling them to leave, before shoving, kicking and slapping them.

Ahed Tamimi is the most aggressive of the two in the video.

The heavily armed soldiers do not respond in the face of what appears to be an attempt to provoke rather than seriously harm them.

They then move backwards after Nariman Tamimi becomes involved. The scuffle took place amid clashes and protests against US President Donald Trump’s controversial recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Relatives say that a member of the Tamimi family was wounded in the head by a rubber bullet fired during those protests. </s> Teenage Palestinian protester Ahed Tamimi is to go on trial before an Israeli military court on Tuesday for slapping and punching two Israeli soldiers.

Teenage Palestinian protester Ahed Tamimi is to go on trial before an Israeli military court on Tuesday for slapping and punching two Israeli soldiers.

Israel’s prosecution of Tamimi, one of an estimated 300 Palestinian minors in Israeli jails, and a senior Israeli official’s recent revelation that he once had parliament investigate whether the blonde, blue-eyed Tamimis are a “real” Palestinian family, have helped stoke ongoing interest in the case. The teenager, who recently turned 17 in jail, has become the latest symbol of the long-running battle between Palestinians and Israelis.

The case touches on what constitutes legitimate resistance to Israel’s rule over millions of Palestinians, already in its 51st year after Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in 1967. Ahed Tamimi’s supporters see a brave girl who struck two armed soldiers outside her West Bank home in frustration after having just learned that Israeli troops seriously wounded a 15-year-old cousin, shooting him in the head from close range with a rubber bullet during nearby stone-throwing clashes.

Demonstrators hold posters in support of the teenager (AP) Israel has treated Tamimi’s actions as a criminal offence, indicting her on charges of assault and incitement that could potentially land her in prison for several years. Tamimi’s arrest from her home in December and her pre-trial court appearances, flanked by Israeli guards and looking impassive, have evoked a sense of history on a loop. Another generation of Palestinians seems locked in a cycle of protests and arrests by Israel, three decades after Palestinians staged their first uprising, throwing stones and burning tyres in the streets.

Since the mid-1990s, several US-mediated rounds of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations on setting up a Palestinian state alongside Israel have ended in failure. Gaps in positions only widened in the past decade, as Israeli settlement expansion continued and the Palestinians failed to end a crippling political split between an internationally backed self-rule government in parts of the West Bank and the Islamic militant group Hamas which dominates Gaza. Tamimi’s father Bassem, who threw his first stone at the age of 14 and was an activist in the first uprising, said he expects the military court will deal harshly with his daughter and that she might remain in prison for some time.

His wife, Nariman, is being prosecuted over the same December 15 scuffle in their village of Nabi Saleh and has been locked up alongside their daughter. </s> CNN reported Sunday that Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi has been released from prison after being arrested and charged for slapping an Israeli soldier. According to the Israeli Prison Authority, Tamimi was imprisoned for eight months and was finally released on Sunday morning along with her mother, Nariman Tamimi.

The Palestinian mother and daughter were transferred from HaSharon Prison in Israel and taken to a border crossing in the West Bank, from which they were able to return to their village, Nabi Saleh.

Upon returning to her village, 17-year-old Ahed Tamimi was greeted by supporters and fans waving Palestinian flags and cheering her on. Standing outside of her house, Tamimi made a brief statement, saying, “From our home, the resistance is continuing until the end of the occupation. I thank everyone who supported me during my arrest.”

Afterwards, Tamimi attended a meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah, who applauded her bravery and perseverance.

The Palestinian news agency, Wafa, reported that Abbas called Tamimi “a model of the Palestinian struggle for freedom, independence and statehood,” encouraging the use of nonviolent protest as an “ideal and vital weapon in facing the repression of the Israeli occupation.”

The President of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, also reached out to Tamimi, lauding her for her strength and courage.

After returning home once again, Tamimi vowed to continue the resistance, adding, “especially our resistance for equality and human rights.”

Having completed her high school education in jail, Tamimi plans to go to law school in order to help detainees with their cases and potentially bring international attention to their struggles. Tamimi, however, was unable to say whether or not she would slap an Israeli soldier again, commenting, “I can’t predict the future.”

“Maybe tomorrow Palestine might be free,” she continued, “and I can’t define what’ll happen in the future. I hope that the occupation goes away so that I don’t think about doing this again.”

“I’ve never lived under peace. This is why I see peace as something important,” she added.

Tamimi’s attorney, Gabi Lasky, told CNN that her arrest was mainly a political move for Israel, urging that arresting minors will not put an end to the longstanding conflict between Israel and Palestine. “I hope our leaders will be courageous enough to reach an agreement and free us all from the chains of occupation,” Lasky said.

After initially being arrested in December on 12 different charges, Tamimi pleaded guilty to four charges in March in exchange for a reduced sentence. The four charges included incitement and disrupting a soldier. </s> Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi, dubbed by some as the Wonder Woman of Palestine, became a symbol of resistance against Israeli military occupation after she was arrested for slapping Israeli soldiers who had raided her home in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh and allegedly shot her cousin in the face with a rubber bullet.

The 17-year-old has finally been freed after spending eight months in a military prison inside Israel. She had taken a plea deal offered by the military prosecution earlier this year, under which she pleaded guilty to charges including assault, incitement and two counts of obstructing soldiers.

It is important to note Israel's military court system boasts a more than 99 percent conviction rate for Palestinians, a factor that likely led the teenager to accept the deal.

As reported by several news outlets, both Tamimi and her mother Narmain, who was also arrested after she filmed her daughter’s viral arrest, were released by the Israeli authorities and transferred to their village, the residents of which have been preparing for the young activist’s return by decorating her home with Palestinian flags and setting up hundreds of chairs in the courtyard to welcome relatives and friends who come to greet her.

Earlier this week, IDF soldiers arrested two Italian artists who painted a giant mural depicting the iconic teenager on West Bank security barrier.

Meanwhile, Bassem Tamimi, the teen’s father, said “we expect her to lead and we will support her to lead” after her release from the prison, according to the Times of Israel. He also added Tamimi was able to take her high school examination in prison and has received scholarship offers from abroad. However, he mentioned she initially wanted to attend a university in the West Bank.

Both Tamimi and her mother are expected to hold a press conference in their village of Nabi Saleh after paying a visit to the tomb of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in Ramallah.

Tamimi was arrested in December 2017 – just a month before she turned 17. At least 30 heavily armed soldiers forcibly entered her house a few days after a video surfaced showing the teen kicking and slapping an Israeli soldier after the troops fired tear-gas canisters directly at her home and also fired a rubber bullet at her 14-year-old cousin, who had to be put into a medically induced coma.

Her arrest sparked global outrage with people all across the world protesting her detainment and demanding to know since when has protecting one’s home against occupying forces become a crime?

Initially, Israeli authorities sought 12 charges against Tamimi – who has been compared to Anne Frank, Nelson Mandela and has been protesting Israeli occupation of her home since she was a little girl. The charges included threatening and assaulting an Israeli soldier, interfering with his duties, throwing objects at individuals and property, and incitement. However, under the plea deal, the prosecution dropped the other eight charges. </s> A teenage Palestinian protester filmed slapping and kicking two soldiers outside her home has appeared before an Israeli military court to face various charges including assaulting security forces, incitement and throwing stones.

Ahed Tamimi, who turned 17 in jail last month, arrived on Tuesday morning for the first day of what could be a months-long trial, in what has become a symbolic case in the battle for international public opinion.

The judge ordered a closed-door hearing and ejected a large group of journalists who had gathered at the Ofer military base, despite a request by Tamimi’s lawyer for the media to be able to observe proceedings.

Tamimi was filmed in December slapping and kicking two soldiers. Her supporters say the incident occurred soon after she discovered Israeli troops had seriously wounded her 15-year-old cousin, who was shot in the head with a rubber bullet during a stone-throwing clash.

Arrested in the middle of the night and since denied bail, Tamimi could face years in prison for what prosecutors argue was a criminal offence. She faces 12 charges, some of which date back to 2016.

Tamimi’s father, Bassem, said on Tuesday that he arrived at trial “with no good expectations, because this a military court, and it’s part of the Israeli military occupation”.

Some of Israel’s critics have said the case epitomises its brutal approach half a decade after its forces captured the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem.

Tamimi comes from the village of Nabi Saleh, where regular protests from its several hundred residents have often ended with stone throwing. Since her early years, she has become an international poster girl for the anti-occupation movement. Rights groups have called for her immediate release.

“As an unarmed girl, Ahed posed no threat during the altercation with the two Israeli soldiers who were heavily armed and wearing protective clothing,” said Magdalena Mughrabi, Amnesty International’s deputy director for the Middle East and Africa.



“Yet again the Israeli authorities have responded to acts of defiance by a Palestinian child with measures that are entirely disproportionate to the incident in question.”

Hysteria over how the world perceives Tamimi, who comes from a family with a long history of both peaceful and violent resistance against the occupation, has spread across both societies.

The footage of Tamimi led to the teenager being hailed as a hero by some Palestinians, who saw her as standing up to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.

One senior Israeli official recently revealed he had asked a parliamentary committee to investigate whether the blond, blue-eyed Tamimi family were “real” Palestinians.



Some Israeli politicians have applauded the restraint of the two soldiers while others have demanded a heavy-handed punishment for what they see as a brazen attack.

“She is not a little girl, she is a terrorist,” said the culture minister, Miri Regev, before the trial. “It’s about time they will understand that people like her have to be in jail and not be allowed to incite to racism and subversion against the state of Israel.”



The Associated Press contributed to this report
Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi is released from an Israeli prison.