Bashir Al-Khatib snatches freedom after 35 years in Israeli prisons

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies + Al Mayadeen
6 Jul 2023 19:41
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The Israeli occupation had arrested Al-Khatib in 1988 and charged him with possessing weapons and explosives and carrying out operations that led to the killing of settlers.

Liberated Palestinian prisoner Bashir Al-Khatib (Social media)

Israeli occupation authorities released on Thursday Palestinian prisoner Bashir Abdullah Kamel Al-Khatib, 60, from the city of Ramla in the Palestinian territories occupied in 1948, after serving his entire 35-year sentence in Israeli prisons.

The Palestinian Prisoners Center for Studies mentioned that the Israeli occupation had arrested Al-Khatib on January 1, 1988, and charged him with possessing weapons and explosives and carrying out commando operations that led to the killing of settlers.

The occupation had sentenced Al-Khatib to life imprisonment, but after successful legal efforts in 2012, the occupation set him to 35 years in prison, which he spent moving between prisons due to his lengthy sentence before he gained his freedom and was released from Al-Naqab desert prison.

According to the center, Al-Khatib was subjected to various types of harassment and violations by the Israeli prisons authority, adding that the occupation refused to include his name in the Wafa Al-Ahrar swap deal in 2011.

The Palestinian Prisoners Center for Studies noted that Al-Khatib is married and has two sons and three daughters, all of whom got married during the period that he spent in Israeli occupation prisons, and today he has eight grandchildren.

The center highlighted that the number of old prisoners, that is, those detained since before the so-called Oslo Accords in 1994, decreased after the release of Al-Khatib to 22, all of them have been arrested for more than a quarter of a century, and the oldest of which is prisoner Mohammad Al-Tous from occupied Al-Khalil.

It is noteworthy that the Israeli occupation continues to detain more than 4,900 Palestinians, including 61 female prisoners, 160 children, and more than 1,000 administrative prisoners.