The hunger strike is due to the terrible situation in prisons
Source : 112 Ukraine
15 September 2021
Open source
Source : 112 Ukraine
15 September 2021
Open source
Palestinian Authorities have stated that nearly 1,400 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons will go on hunger strike to protest the conditions of their detention. This was reported by the Times of Israel.
“The situation is very bad in the prisons, that’s why they’re going on hunger strike,” said Abu Bakr, head of the Palestinian Authority’s commission for prisoners.
He also said that talks between the Israeli prison administration and representatives of the prisoners had not yet progressed.
According to Qadri Abu Bakr, 1,380 prisoners - out of more than 4,000 Palestinians held in Israeli jails - were due to go on strike on Friday and be joined by other prisoners next week.
Related: Israeli military planes bomb Hamas plants on missile, concrete production
The allegations are said to have been made after Palestinian prisoners staged riots in several Israeli prisons and set fire to nine cells in Ketziot and Ramon prisons in southern Israel.
As it was reported earlier, Israeli security forces caught four of the six Palestinian militants who escaped from a high-security prison. It is noted that through the hole in the floor of the prison cell escaped six people who were either convicted or suspected of planning or committing deadly attacks on Israelis.
Israeli officials have vowed to conduct a thorough investigation into security breaches that allowed the detainees to escape.
Two thirds of the Palestinian detainees at the Israeli Etzion facility are minors - commission
Israeli soldiers detaining a Palestinian minor.
RAMALLAH, Wednesday, September 15, 2021 (WAFA) – Two thirds of the Palestinian detainees in an Israeli detention facility at the illegal Etzion settlement bloc, south of the southern West Bank city of Bethlehem, are minors, today said the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission.
It said in a press release that there were 24 Palestinian minors in the detention facility of Etzion, accounting for two thirds of the total number of detainees there, pointing that most of the minors recently imprisoned in the notorious facility were subjected to various forms of torture, physical and psychological, during their detention and interrogation.
It added that they were beaten in a brutal way, thrown to the ground and trampled on, as they were hit with the gun butts all over their body, sworn at and kept for long hours at an army facility with their hands cuffed and without any food before they are taken to prison.
There are currently 39 Palestinian detainees held at the Etzion facility, said the commission.
K.F./M.K.
Captured prison escapee Zubeidi was severely beaten after his arrest, suffers broken ribs, says commission
Zakaria Zubeidi after his capture with a swollen face from beating.
RAMALLAH, Wednesday, September 15, 2021 (WAFA) - The Commission for Detainees and Ex-Prisoners Affairs said today that Zakaria Zubeidi, one of four Palestinians who were caught over the weekend after his escape from prison in Israel along with five others last week, was beaten and ill-treated during and after his capture resulting in him suffering from broken jaw and ribs.
It said that one of its lawyers was able to visit Zubeidi in his prison cell this morning after an Israeli court lifted the ban on their visits and was able to check on his situation four days after his capture.
Zubeidi, said the Commission in a statement, was transferred to an Israeli hospital after the arrest due to the beating and was given sedatives. He suffers from bruises and cuts all over his body as a result of beatings and torture.
Zubeidi told his lawyer that he did not take part in digging the escape tunnel in their cell and that he was moved to the cell of the other escapees one day before they broke out from the prison.
He said that during the four days he was out of prison, they did not ask for help from anyone out of concern for the Palestinian people who may suffer from the Israeli reprisal measures and that they did not drink water throughout their short freedom while they ate only fruits they found in the fields, such as cactus, figs, and others.
Two of the prison escapees remain at large.
M.K.
After visiting re-captured prisoner Mohammad Arda, lawyer says he was severely beaten, denied food and water
Zakaria Zubeidi after his capture with a swollen face from beating.
RAMALLAH, Wednesday, September 15, 2021 (WAFA) - The Commission for Detainees and Ex-Prisoners Affairs said today that Zakaria Zubeidi, one of four Palestinians who were caught over the weekend after his escape from prison in Israel along with five others last week, was beaten and ill-treated during and after his capture resulting in him suffering from broken jaw and ribs.
It said that one of its lawyers was able to visit Zubeidi in his prison cell this morning after an Israeli court lifted the ban on their visits and was able to check on his situation four days after his capture.
Zubeidi, said the Commission in a statement, was transferred to an Israeli hospital after the arrest due to the beating and was given sedatives. He suffers from bruises and cuts all over his body as a result of beatings and torture.
Zubeidi told his lawyer that he did not take part in digging the escape tunnel in their cell and that he was moved to the cell of the other escapees one day before they broke out from the prison.
He said that during the four days he was out of prison, they did not ask for help from anyone out of concern for the Palestinian people who may suffer from the Israeli reprisal measures and that they did not drink water throughout their short freedom while they ate only fruits they found in the fields, such as cactus, figs, and others.
Two of the prison escapees remain at large.
M.K.
After visiting re-captured prisoner Mohammad Arda, lawyer says he was severely beaten, denied food and water
The re-captured prisoners Mahmoud and Mohammad Arda.
RAMALLAH, Wednesday, September 15, 2021 (WAFA) – Attorney Khaled Mahajna, a lawyer with the Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners Affairs Commission, revealed after meeting with Mohammad Arda, one of four re-captured Palestinian prisoners, that since his re-arrest on Friday, Arda, has been subjected to physical abuse, deprivation of sleep, denial of food and water, and humiliation, that caused him injuries to his head and face.
Mahajna recounted the details of his visit to Arda at dawn today after an Israeli court lifted the ban imposed by the Israeli Security Services on visits by the lawyers to the four prisoners. The Security Services nevertheless allowed only one lawyer’s visit to a single prisoner at one time.
Mahajna said in an interview with Palestine TV after this visit with Mohammad Arda at his detention center that the Israeli occupation forces brutally assaulted him at the moment of his capture, noting that he was hit on the head and above the right eye, and he has not received treatment until now, and that he suffers from many wounds sustained during his pursuit and arrest.
Arda was also stripped of his clothes during interrogation at Nazareth prison after which he was transferred to another interrogation center.
He pointed out that since last Saturday, Arda has been undergoing interrogation around the clock and that he has not slept since his arrest five days ago except for about 10 hours.
He said the interrogators tried to bargain with him on false charges and that one of the interrogators threatened to shoot him.
Mahajna said that Arda is kept in a narrow two meters by one mete cell and monitored around the clock by cameras and guards. He did not eat food from the moment of his arrest until yesterday. He was also denied sleep and rest, and he was moved between the cell and the interrogation room and was never allowed out so he does not know what time it is and he prays without knowing the times for the prayers.
Arda is being interrogated every day while he is handcuffed and his feet shackled, said attorney Mahajna, explaining that he was handcuffed and surrounded by six guards during his visit to him.
“I walked around the streets of my occupied country for five days, and I was hoping to meet my mother,” Arda told his lawyer. “This was enough to make up for me for all the years of my imprisonment."
He pointed out that members of the Israeli military units that re-captured him and the other prisoner, Zakaria Zubeidi, assaulted Zubeidi before they were separated when they arrived at the interrogation center after which he did not know anything about Zubeidi.
Regarding the moment of Arda’s arrest, Mahajna said that the occupation forces arrested him when he was sleeping in the trunk of a truck. One of the soldiers searched inside the trunk and at the last moment was able to grab the prisoner, who tried to escape but he could not.
Another Commission attorney, Raslan Mahajna, met with a Mahmoud Arda, another recapture prisoner and said that Mahmoud told him they did not attempt to enter the Arab towns in Israel to spare their Palestinian residents retaliation by the Israeli authorities.
He said the six of them who broke out of Gilboa prison in northern Israel last week walked together after their escape until they reached al-Naoura village and then went in separate ways in groups of two.
He said they tried to reach the West Bank but could not because of the military checkpoints.
He said that their re-capture was by chance after a police patrol saw them and stopped them, explaining that they started to dig the tunnel in their prison cell in December of last year until their time of escape.
The attorneys are expected to also visit the remaining two captured prisoners, Zubeidi and Yacoub al-Qaderi.
M.K.
Capture of escaped Palestinian prisoners divides Arab-Israelis
Minister of Public Security Omer Bar-Lev thanked Arab-Israelis for assisting in the capture of escaped Palestinian prisoners, but not all of them are comfortable with the situation.
A Palestinian child stands next to a poster expressing solidarity with the six Palestinian prisoners who escaped from Israel's Gilboa prison hanging outside a shop at the Jenin camp for Palestinian refugees in the north of the occupied West Bank on Sept. 12, 2021. -
Minister of Public Security Omer Bar-Lev thanked Arab-Israelis for assisting in the capture of escaped Palestinian prisoners, but not all of them are comfortable with the situation.
A Palestinian child stands next to a poster expressing solidarity with the six Palestinian prisoners who escaped from Israel's Gilboa prison hanging outside a shop at the Jenin camp for Palestinian refugees in the north of the occupied West Bank on Sept. 12, 2021. -
JAAFAR ASHTIYEH/AFP via Getty Images
Afif Abu Much
@AfifAbuMuch
September 15, 2021
Arab-Israeli society was split over the escape of six Palestinian inmates from prison, and the divide has only grown deeper with the capture of four of them.
The affair started on Sept. 6, when six Palestinian prisoners managed to escape from Gilboa Prison, apparently through a tunnel. Gilboa Prison's reputation as Israel’s most secure penitentiary heightened the drama, as did the identity of the prisoners: Zakaria Zubeidi, a former senior commander in Fatah’s armed wing Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, along with five members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
On Sept. 11, after days of manhunt, four of the prisoners were captured in two separate incidents in different locations. The first two, Yaqoub Qadri and Mahmoud Ardah, were caught on Mount Precipice in Nazareth, after a local resident called the police to report suspicious individuals who he suspected of being in Israel illegally. The other two, Zakaria Zubeidi and Mohammed Ardah, were caught at a truck stop in the northern town of Umm al-Ghanam. Their arrest took place after a local tractor driver saw them and reported them to the police. The hunt for the remaining two fugitives continues.
The mixed reactions in Arab-Israeli society and the arrest of the four men with the help of Arab-Israeli citizens form another chapter of the complex story of Arab society in Israel in the twenty-first century. Once again, Israelis learned that Arab citizens are no longer a homogeneous bloc with the same views. Rather, they represent a rich variety of opinions and positions. Minister of Public Security Omer Bar-Lev expressed gratitude for the role played by Arab citizens in capturing the escaped prisoners. However, there was also a demonstration in support of the prisoners by political activists from several Arab parties, during which a reporter for Channel 13 News covering the hearing and the demonstration was injured.
These contradicting reactions are an example of the multiplicity of opinions in contemporary Arab society on a number of topics. For instance, we witnessed contradicting reactions within Arab-Israeli society to the signing of the normalization agreements with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. We saw contradicting reactions to the Joint List’s split into two separate parties on the eve of last March's election, to the decision by Muslim Ra'am Party to join the coalition and various other issues. Clearly, Arab society is far more diverse than conventional wisdom once held.
One could argue that there is no comparison between the escaped prisoners and the other issues. Nevertheless, it showed how Arab society in Israel cannot be expected to speak in one voice. This misperception was clear a few months ago, when demonstrations erupted in the country’s mixed towns. It was also evident when the IDF refused to let Arab truck drivers to enter military bases as contractors during Operation “Guardian of the Walls” last May.
Samer Atamni, a political activist who founded the Rayetna Movement for coexistence, discussed the situation with Al-Monitor. “Arab society is a society in transition. Like any other society in the world, it has a diverse array of ideas, which are best expressed in attitudes about self-identification and citizenship. We are currently witnessing a clearly existential process, the proof being the rise and success of [Ra’am leader] Mansour Abbas with his moderate platform, focusing more on civil than on national rights. Arab society is split and conflicted over how it defines its future and its participation in Israeli society. It is concerned to some degree or other about the loss of identity, but this [topic] creates confusion among Jews and Arabs alike.’’
Atamni said that this confusion clouded the escape. “There were those who identified fully with their escape and all that this represents in terms of their struggle for freedom and an end to the occupation. But there were also those — and I think they are a minority — who opposed providing them with aid and reported them to the police. The debate between these two groups is blowing up on social media.”
It must be remembered that Arab society in Israel was originally part of a larger Palestinian people. They did not emerge out of nowhere in 1948 with the founding of the State of Israel. They were part of the country’s indigenous Arab population who happened to receive Israeli citizenship when the state was founded. The hunt after the escapees spotlit the paradox lived and experienced by a significant part of Israel’s Arab population and the complex circumstances that they deal with on a daily basis.
On one hand, Arab-Israelis want to be law-abiding citizens and an integral part of Israeli society. On the other hand, they struggle to come to terms with the long and ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands. This paradox evoked debate on social networks over the capture of four of the fugitives in Nazareth and Umm al-Ghanam and questions about the common destiny of Arabs on the Israeli side of the Green Line and the Palestinian people living in the West Bank and Gaza.
Sami Ali, a strategist and former spokesperson for the Joint List, told Al-Monitor that there is consensus among Arab-Israelis on the escape. "There was no debate and no opposition to their escape from any part of the Palestinian people: not in the West Bank, not in Gaza, and not among the Arab citizens of Israel. There is consensus that the prisoners have a right to freedom and liberty, but expressions of identification among Palestinian citizens of Israeli were limited to social networks. The reason for this is that when it comes to political-security issues, Israel treats its Arab citizens as potential suspects. Even the prisoners themselves showed personal responsibility by maintaining a distance and not coming into direct contact with Arab citizens of Israel, because they are aware of the dangerous implications this could have for them.”
Read more: https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2021/09/capture-escaped-palestinian-prisoners-divides-arab-israelis#ixzz76YtBKAfu
Afif Abu Much
@AfifAbuMuch
September 15, 2021
Arab-Israeli society was split over the escape of six Palestinian inmates from prison, and the divide has only grown deeper with the capture of four of them.
The affair started on Sept. 6, when six Palestinian prisoners managed to escape from Gilboa Prison, apparently through a tunnel. Gilboa Prison's reputation as Israel’s most secure penitentiary heightened the drama, as did the identity of the prisoners: Zakaria Zubeidi, a former senior commander in Fatah’s armed wing Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, along with five members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
On Sept. 11, after days of manhunt, four of the prisoners were captured in two separate incidents in different locations. The first two, Yaqoub Qadri and Mahmoud Ardah, were caught on Mount Precipice in Nazareth, after a local resident called the police to report suspicious individuals who he suspected of being in Israel illegally. The other two, Zakaria Zubeidi and Mohammed Ardah, were caught at a truck stop in the northern town of Umm al-Ghanam. Their arrest took place after a local tractor driver saw them and reported them to the police. The hunt for the remaining two fugitives continues.
The mixed reactions in Arab-Israeli society and the arrest of the four men with the help of Arab-Israeli citizens form another chapter of the complex story of Arab society in Israel in the twenty-first century. Once again, Israelis learned that Arab citizens are no longer a homogeneous bloc with the same views. Rather, they represent a rich variety of opinions and positions. Minister of Public Security Omer Bar-Lev expressed gratitude for the role played by Arab citizens in capturing the escaped prisoners. However, there was also a demonstration in support of the prisoners by political activists from several Arab parties, during which a reporter for Channel 13 News covering the hearing and the demonstration was injured.
These contradicting reactions are an example of the multiplicity of opinions in contemporary Arab society on a number of topics. For instance, we witnessed contradicting reactions within Arab-Israeli society to the signing of the normalization agreements with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. We saw contradicting reactions to the Joint List’s split into two separate parties on the eve of last March's election, to the decision by Muslim Ra'am Party to join the coalition and various other issues. Clearly, Arab society is far more diverse than conventional wisdom once held.
One could argue that there is no comparison between the escaped prisoners and the other issues. Nevertheless, it showed how Arab society in Israel cannot be expected to speak in one voice. This misperception was clear a few months ago, when demonstrations erupted in the country’s mixed towns. It was also evident when the IDF refused to let Arab truck drivers to enter military bases as contractors during Operation “Guardian of the Walls” last May.
Samer Atamni, a political activist who founded the Rayetna Movement for coexistence, discussed the situation with Al-Monitor. “Arab society is a society in transition. Like any other society in the world, it has a diverse array of ideas, which are best expressed in attitudes about self-identification and citizenship. We are currently witnessing a clearly existential process, the proof being the rise and success of [Ra’am leader] Mansour Abbas with his moderate platform, focusing more on civil than on national rights. Arab society is split and conflicted over how it defines its future and its participation in Israeli society. It is concerned to some degree or other about the loss of identity, but this [topic] creates confusion among Jews and Arabs alike.’’
Atamni said that this confusion clouded the escape. “There were those who identified fully with their escape and all that this represents in terms of their struggle for freedom and an end to the occupation. But there were also those — and I think they are a minority — who opposed providing them with aid and reported them to the police. The debate between these two groups is blowing up on social media.”
It must be remembered that Arab society in Israel was originally part of a larger Palestinian people. They did not emerge out of nowhere in 1948 with the founding of the State of Israel. They were part of the country’s indigenous Arab population who happened to receive Israeli citizenship when the state was founded. The hunt after the escapees spotlit the paradox lived and experienced by a significant part of Israel’s Arab population and the complex circumstances that they deal with on a daily basis.
On one hand, Arab-Israelis want to be law-abiding citizens and an integral part of Israeli society. On the other hand, they struggle to come to terms with the long and ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands. This paradox evoked debate on social networks over the capture of four of the fugitives in Nazareth and Umm al-Ghanam and questions about the common destiny of Arabs on the Israeli side of the Green Line and the Palestinian people living in the West Bank and Gaza.
Sami Ali, a strategist and former spokesperson for the Joint List, told Al-Monitor that there is consensus among Arab-Israelis on the escape. "There was no debate and no opposition to their escape from any part of the Palestinian people: not in the West Bank, not in Gaza, and not among the Arab citizens of Israel. There is consensus that the prisoners have a right to freedom and liberty, but expressions of identification among Palestinian citizens of Israeli were limited to social networks. The reason for this is that when it comes to political-security issues, Israel treats its Arab citizens as potential suspects. Even the prisoners themselves showed personal responsibility by maintaining a distance and not coming into direct contact with Arab citizens of Israel, because they are aware of the dangerous implications this could have for them.”
Read more: https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2021/09/capture-escaped-palestinian-prisoners-divides-arab-israelis#ixzz76YtBKAfu
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