by Fadi Arouri
29 April 2012 | Fadi Arouri Photography
by Sylvia
24 April 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
On the 17th of April, Palestinian political prisoners launched a mass hunger strike against the Israeli Prison Service’s (IPS) dismissal of the Fourth Geneva Convention and basic international law. The call for action comes on Palestinian Prisoners Day after a wave of high-profile hunger strikes evoked a global reaction.
Palestinian Support and Human Rights Association Addameer originally estimated that some 1,200 Palestinian prisoners would participate, along with approximately 2,300 others refusing meals in preparation for a wider campaign. Today, Israeli lawyers say the campaign has reached 3,000 participants.
The hunger striking prisoners’ demands include: an end to the IPS’s abusive use of isolation for “security” reasons, currently affecting 19 prisoners, some of whom have spent 10 years in isolation; an end to the detainment of Palestinians without charge or trial in administrative detention, under which 322 Palestinians are currently detained; a repeal of a series of punitive measures taken against Palestinian prisoners following the capture of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, including the denial of family visits for all Gaza prisoners since 2007 and denial of access to university education since June 2011.
These demands were echoed yesterday when Khader Adnan visited the village of Tubas, where the relatives of political prisoners gathered in a tent outside the Municipal offices. Standing before a wall covered in the cherished photographs of absent men, Adnan spoke of his 66 day hunger strike, giving solace to worried parents and siblings:
“We have a message for those mothers; we honour you. If the doors to the prisons are closed, the door of God will always be open.”
The International Solidarity Movement accompanied members of Tubas Prisoners Club and Khader Adnan to visit families of prisoners in their homes. Mohamamad Taj, who is 42 years old, has been on hunger strike since March 15. His family has not been given permission to visit the prison and await news of his condition. Adnan’s visit brought strength and resolution, stressing the need for solidarity amongst prisoners with sight of a clear goal. He mentioned that prisoners are united despite political differences outside the prison walls.
Acts like these are being mirrored all over Palestine. The prisoners’ solidarity tent has been standing since Palestinian Prisoners Day and is welcome to visitors to express their support and write a message in the visitor book. The face of Hassan Safadi is present amongst the many photographs plastered to the tent’s walls. As he enters his 53rd day of hunger strike, his family are still being denied contact with him and his health condition is still unknown. As his struggle is replicated by some 3,000 prisoners, the international community stands in solidarity against Israel for the same goal.
FREE HASSAN SAFADI
FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS OF PALESTINE
Sylvia is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
17 April 2012 | Al Haq
As an organisation dedicated to the promotion and protection of Palestinian human rights, Al-Haq would like to take the opportunity of Palestinian Prisoners’ Day to highlight the ongoing violation of the rights of Palestinians incarcerated in Israeli prisons, many of whom are interned without charge or trial. The continuing ill-treatment of some 4,600 political prisoners, which includes internment, the denial of family and lawyer visits, prolonged periods of isolation, and the lack of fair trial, has largely been overlooked ed by a wider international community that has grown more and more desensitized to such violations of international law. Click here to read more.
by Sylvia
14 April 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
“Our souls are not devastated, we are hanging on”
On the 7th November 2011, founder of the Palestinian Cultural Enlightenment (Tanwer) and lecturer at the An- Najah University, Dr. Yousef Abdul Haq, was arrested from his home at two o’clock in the morning. Dr. Yousef is in his 70’s and his health has suffered from mental strain and poor prison conditions. Well known for his calm and peaceful nature, Dr. Yousef’s daughter insists that her father “will always support his people by telling the truth: a lot of people are living in poverty because they are under occupation. If my father tells the truth, eventually everyone will understand.”
Administrative detention is legally incompatible with basic international standards of human rights, when Israel holds the accused without charge or trial for long periods of time. The evidence of his or her offense is held in a “secret file,” which cannot be seen by the detainee or defense lawyer. The file is prepared by the Israeli intelligence service, which has gathered “evidence” by illegal means.
This has left Dr. Yousef’s family with no clue as to why he was taken in the middle of the night.
“No one has told us anything” says Yousef’s 21 year old daughter Shayma, a third year student at the An- Najah University. Dr. Yousef is a lecturer in economics and human rights and his co-creation of the Palestinian Enlightenment Project has painted him as a symbol of peaceful and intellectual freedom.
TAKE ACTION: Show your solidarity for Dr. Yousef and all Palestinians
abducted by Israel and taken to Zionist prisons.
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Shayma describes the last night she saw her father, the rapping of fists and unfamiliar sound of Hebrew at her door house. She remembers distinctly as he faded into the shadow of the jeeps outside her windows.
“It’s strange” she said, “My father was laughing. He is as strong as iron or steel. When we talk to him, it is him who encourages us when it should be the other way around.”
On that night, the family assumed he would be interrogated then released and waited from two until six in the morning before reading in the newspaper that he would be kept under administrative detention for four months.
It is this absence of information which makes this experience so agonizing for Palestinian prisoner’s families. Now in the sixth month of his administrative detention, Dr. Yousef’s release is pushed further back from the horizon each time it comes into sight with no explanation or court hearing.
When asked what she thinks will happen, Shayma explains “We hope for something. My mother is depressed, she is worried and she can’t sleep since she has heard of how they torture inmates.”
Though the family has rare permission to visit Ofer prison inside ‘48 territory, Dr. Yousef has advised against it. The journey has been made degrading and lengthy, sometimes waiting for hours in uncomfortable conditions as a further means of adding to the suffering of the Palestinian people. “It will only make it harder for us emotionally,” Shayma explained.
Articles 42 and 78 of the Fourth Geneva Convention permits administrative detention only “if the security of the Detaining Power makes it absolutely necessary “or for “imperative reasons of security”. These terms are widely accepted as applicable to the occupied territories of Palestine. The convention articulates that all civilians, weather in occupies territories or not, are fundamentally “entitled, in all circumstances, to respect from their persons, their honor, their family rights, their religious convictions and practices and their manners and customs”. These terms can only cease after the effective end of occupation. Israel ratified the Fourth Geneva Convention in 1951 and is bound by its terms.
That Dr. Yousef’s detention denies a class of young, educated Palestinian’s of human rights lecturer is of no coincidence. Israel’s use of administrative detention to silence political figureheads is a concern raised by human rights movement Amnesty International, who explained that prisoners of conscious were being held “solely for non-violent exercise of their right to freedom of expression and association.”
“Our souls are not broken, we are hanging on”, says Shayma. As the struggle for her father’s freedom continues, she recalls her father’s advice, calling for unity and intellectual freedom.
Sylvia is a volunteer with International Solidarity Movement (name has been changed).
by Silvia and Andreas
13 April 2012 | International Solidarity Movement, West Bank
Please SUBMIT pictures in solidarity with Hassan Safady
FREE HASSAN SAFADY
FREE ALL PRISONERS IN ADMINSTRATIVE DETENTION
Today Hasan Safady entered into his 42nd day of hunger strike. Ten months ago, he was brutally arrested from his home in the old city of Nablus and has since then been kept in administrative detention. Hassan’s older brother Fouad Safady explains that their family have been denied any communication or visits to Hassan, so any information gained has been acquired through his lawyer. Since Hassan began his hunger strike he has been exposed to severe violence and beatings from prison guards. In a further attempt to silence his resistance, Hassan has been threatened with an 800 shekel fine for each day of his hunger strike. This will have devastating economic consequences for him and his family.
Hassan’s condition became more critical ten days ago, when he was transferred to Ramla prison hospital. His health is said to have further deteriorated since he stopped taking water five days ago. This extreme measure was a response to his placement in solitary confinement. After being transferred to Ramla Hospital, Hassan’s lawyer was presented with a report about his medical condition stating that he has severe pains in stomach and head, and that his kidneys are in danger of taking irreparable damage.
Until now his family has had no information of his release. Hassan has been in administrative detention for a total of 105 months during the last ten years. His family is unsurprisingly resigned about the situation; “They will probably release him at some point and then arrest him again after two or three months. They play with us,” says Fouad Safad.
The Safady family has suffered irrevocably at the hands of the occupation. In 1996 Hassans brother Farik was killed by the Israeli army. Hassan’s parents have had to watch as each of their children were imprisoned or detained in Israeli military jails. In a deal like that of Hana Shalabi’s, Hassan’s sister and husband have been deported to Gaza in exchange for their freedom, adding to the agonizing division of the Safady family.
Outside the family home, pictures and posters of Hassan plaster the walls of a solidarity tent, a final act of resistance allowing friends and family to gather and share support. However, the Israeli army is determined to relinquish any remaining hope the Safady family may still hinder. On Sunday night the occupation forces entered the old city of Nablus, destroying the tent and tearing up photographs of Hassan.
Hassan Safady is one of many Palestinian prisoners who have found the refusal of food to be the only remaining tool in their political resistance to administrative detention. Hassan’s hunger strike has now entered a critical phase, as everyday it becomes less and less likely that his body will ever gain a full recovery.
Immediate international attention and solidarity is needed for Hassan and his family as they continue their struggle for freedom and justice.
Andreas and Silvia are volunteers with International Solidarity Movement (names have been changed).