'Israel' purposefully neglecting prisoners demands: PPC
3 Min Read
The Palestinian Prisoners Club warns against the health problems that hunger-striking Palestinian prisoners could face in light of the Israeli occupation's policy of medical neglect.
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Israeli occupation soldiers detaining a Palestinian man in the West Bank, occupied Palestine
Palestinian prisoners are hunger-striking to protest the Israeli occupation's administrative detention, the longest of which being 111 days by prisoner Khalil Awawdeh and 76 days by Raed Rayan.
The prisoners are in critical health conditions while the Israeli occupation's prisons authorities are refusing to respond to their demands for liberation.
The Palestinian Prisoners Club said Awawdeh's case should clear up by June 26, which is the date his current administrative detention ends. However, it would not be out of the ordinary if the Israeli occupation chooses to arbitrarily extend his sentence.
The PPC later reported that prisoner Awawdeh suspended his hunger strike on the 111th day after the Israeli occupation pledged to end his arbitrary detention.
Prisoner Rayan, on the other hand, is still on hunger strike, starting his 76th day today. He is still detained in the Ramlah prison clinic after the occupation transferred him there from Ofer prison on May 23. Nothing is clear about his case so far.
The PPC underlined that the Israeli occupation was neglecting the prisoners' demands on purpose in a bid to have them reach a highly critical health condition with grave repercussions in the long run.
The head of the Palestinian Prisoners and Ex-prisoners Affairs Commission, Qadri Abu Bakr, revealed on Wednesday that the Israeli occupation threatened prisoners to deny them any access to medical treatment if they do not end their open-ended hunger strike.
Palestinian prisoners Khalil Awawdeh, 40, from the town of Idna in Al-Khalil, and Raed Rayan, 27, from the village of Beit Duqu north of Al-Quds, have been hunger-striking for months, demanding their freedom robbed by the Israeli occupation.
Rayan has been suffering from headaches and joint, flank, and knee pain, as well as difficulty in walking. He has not been examined by a doctor and has not undergone any medical examinations since the beginning of his hunger strike, while Awawdeh is suffering from severe joint pain, headaches, vertigo, and blurred vision. He is also unable to move and is wheelchair-bound.
Palestinian prisoner Zakaria Al-Zubaidi, one of the prisoners behind Operation Freedom Tunnel, which saw six brave prisoners liberating themselves from the unjust prisons of the Israeli occupation, is on the 17th day of his hunger strike launched in solidarity with the hunger-striking prisoners.
This comes as 640 administrative detainees are still boycotting the Israeli occupation courts in protest of the policy of administrative detention.
There are 682 administrative detainees in the Israeli occupation's prisons out of some 4,600 prisoners. Reports show that there have been more than 54,000 administrative detention orders since 1967.
Among the administrative detainees are two female prisoners and a child, most of whom are in the prisons of Ofer (233), Al-Naqab (259), and Megiddo (89).
