Omar Hamed

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Omar Hamed

Omar Hamed holds a Palestinian flag at an anti-globalisation protest in Melbourne, Australia in 2006
Born 1988
New Zealand

Omar Hamed is an anarchist political activist and student based in Aotearoa New Zealand who was arrested in the October 15 anti-terror raids.

Contents

[edit] Background

He was born in Greece to European and Palestinian parents, and raised on Auckland's Northshore.[1][2]


[edit] Activism

He has told media that he gained his inspiration to become an activist from seeing his mother struggling to stop National and New Zealand First attacks on social welfare in the 1990s.[2]

While a student at Takapuna Grammar School he was instrumental in setting up Radical Youth, an anti-capitalist organisation for young people.[1]

He has also been involved in the Palestinian rights group Students for Justice in Palestine[3] and helps run an activist social center in Auckland called A Space Inside.

He is also a member of the Auckland Anarchist Collective.[2]

In 2007, he was involved in a protest in support of Iranian hunger striker Ali Panah at Mt Eden Prison. He, along with six other people, was arrested. He was given diversion and community service. The day following the protest, Ali Panah was freed from the remand prison.

[edit] Writings

Hamed is also a published writer, having won an award for an article he wrote for the College Herald,[1] he has had several articles published on the news website Scoop[2] he has also written for the Provoke Network[4] a youth advocacy group run by the Ministry of Youth Development,[5] and Workers Party magazine The Spark.[6]

Hamed is an editor at Indymedia Aotearoa.

[edit] October 2007 terror raids

One of seventeen people arrested in police raids that occurred in October 2007, it is alleged he was in possession of firearms in the Ruatoki Valley. He is currently facing three charges of illegal possession of a firearm and one of unlawful possession of Molotov cocktails.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c Alleged terrorist's name revealed. New Zealand Herald (2007-10-25).
  2. ^ a b c d Urewera 17 Profile: Omar Hamed - Student Activist. Scoop.co.nz (2007-10-25).
  3. ^ Suspect is member of Palestinian rights group. New Zealand Herald (2007-10-26).
  4. ^ Taking back our rights. Aotearoa Youth Voices.
  5. ^ Provoke Network. Aotearoa Youth Voices.
  6. ^ Youth pay revolt heats up. The Spark (April 2006).