A prominent physician in Australia, Jamal Rifi from Lebanon, was sentenced in absentia to ten years in prison in Lebanon for the crime of "normalization with Israel," VOA and Albawaba reported on Wednesday.
Dr. Rifi works with Sydney's Jewish Community on a charity program that organizes treatment for Palestinians in Israeli hospitals. The program trains Palestinian medical workers and helps transfer sick children from Gaza and other Palestinian areas to Israeli hospitals. They have also helped during the COVID-19 pandemic by providing ventilators to the Palestinian health system.
Dr. Rifi's brother, Ashraf, is a former justice minister in Lebanon and informed him of the sentencing because of his association with the Jewish organizations in his charity work.
"The Lebanese military tribunal sentenced me to ten years' imprisonment for being a collaborator and a traitor with the enemy," said Dr. Ashraf to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "Nobody wants to be labelled as a traitor, and I am really upset, and it is a distraction from the work that I am doing right now."
He added that the sentencing was a reflection on the corruption of the Lebanese system.
The sentencing means that if Dr. Rifi tries to go visit his family in Lebanon, he will be immediately arrested and put in prison for ten years.
Dr. Rifi is not the only person to be sentenced to prison for ties with Israelis or Jews.
Amin Muhammad Mari Baydoun holds a US citizenship and was sentenced to 5 years in prison for "dealing with the Israeli enemy," according to Albawaba.
Baydoun was arrested at the Beirut airport in June.
Likewise, according to the Albawaba report, Marc Charbel Tanios was sentenced to two years for "communicating with the Israeli enemy and exchanging emails with it," and Lebanese political opponent Kinda el-Khatib was sentenced to three years in prison for working with Israel.