After 20 days in detention, the Department of State Security has freed the three Israeli filmmakers who were earlier arrested over an alleged link with the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
The three victims were released after staying in DSS custody without being charged to court.
The Whistler identified the three zionist activists as Rudy Rochman, filmmaker Noam Leibman and French-Israeli journalist E. David Benaym.
They were arrested on July 9 by the DSS on allegations that they identified with the Nnamdi Kanu-led Indigenous People of Biafra.
The victims were arrested at Ogidi in Idemili North Local Government Area of Anambra State when they were shooting a film entitled “We Were Never Lost”.
The plot of the documentary is an exploration of Jewish communities in African countries, such as Kenya, Madagascar, Uganda, and Nigeria.
The filmmakers, who were freed on Tuesday, left for Israel Wednesday evening.
They were quoted as saying that they were detained at the DSS facilities in Awka for a day before being conveyed to Abuja.
They claimed Nigerian bloggers hijacked images from the social media pages of “We Were Never Lost” and ‘fabricated an association between the Israeli crew and separatist movements in Southern Nigeria likely in order to gain more publicity.
According to sources, “Nigerian government ‘suspected’ the team and took them into custody by over a dozen DSS men with black ski masks at gunpoint.
“From the moment they were taken, their phones and passports were stripped from them. They were at no point of their detainment able to contact anyone.”
They also alleged that they were locked in a small cell with no access to showers or clean clothes, and ‘were interrogated and mistreated without ever officially being arrested or accused of anything’.
“The three weeks in captivity has only fueled the team’s desire to tell the stories of the Igbo Jews and will continue working for them to get mainstream reception,” our correspondent was told by an Igbo activist, who does not want to be mentioned.
