Palestinian prisoners kick off civil disobedience against occupation
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The Supreme Emergency Committee for Palestinian Prisoners says the prisoners are starting civil disobedience in the face of the occupation.
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A Palestinian protester returns a teargas canister toward IOF soldiers during confrontations near the West Bank refugee camp of Qalandia, south of Ramallah, December 27, 2022 (AP Photo)
The Supreme Emergency Committee for Prisoners announced Monday the start of civil disobedience as of Tuesday morning, noting that the first start from Nafha Prison. The committee said the action would expand to include the rest of the prisons.
According to the committee, the escalatory steps include wearing the brown uniform imposed by the prison administration on prisoners.
The step means that the prisoners' willingness to escalate against the Israeli occupation's prison administration and close the sections to put an end to various measures taken by the occupation, including the security check, where prisoners are handcuffed and forced out of their cells.
The committee took the decision to kick off a series of steps against the occupation, which will start with disobedience and end with an open hunger strike starting Ramadan.
The Supreme Emergency Committee for Prisoners issued a statement stressing that "our only demand is freedom [...] Everyone must get our message and hear our voice, for we can no longer tolerate the violations being committed against us day and night."
"This strike, bearing the banner of freedom or martyrdom, is a strike that will be undergone by every capable prisoner regardless of what faction they belong to," the committee added.
"The amount of aggression we have been facing since the start of the year, and this requires all of our people to support us with all means possible," it said.
The prisoners underlined that they were going to undergo the strike under unified demands and unified leadership.
The Palestinian Ministry of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs announced that the steps to be taken by Palestinian prisoners will start with them disobeying their jailers, disrupting the security check process, and wearing their uniforms.
In a similar vein, Israeli media reported on a decision taken by far-right Israeli Police Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to "reduce the duration of each prisoner's shower to only four minutes as part of his policy of harassing the prisoners."
Palestinian prisoners sent a message from inside the Israeli occupation prisons in early February asking their citizens to prepare to wage a major battle against the oppression of Ben-Gvir.
In their message, the prisoners stressed their readiness for all possibilities and called for Palestinians to protest in different areas of the occupied land.
In their message, the prisoners indicated that "the Minister of police in the extremist occupation government, Ben-Gvir, is working on stifling the prisoners by depriving us of all the gains that we have achieved through great struggles and long sacrifices during which martyrs have fallen, and he [Ben-Gvir] is taking punitive measures against us, which we cannot allow."
The prisoners called on the Palestinian people to support them and stand with them in their strategic and decisive battle, which they intend to launch on March 21, noting that "choosing this date is not a coincidence, as it is the date of the victory of our movement and our revolution over this occupier in the battle of dignity."
The military affairs commentator on the Israeli channel Kan, Roi Sharon, quoted a security source as saying, "The strictness regarding the conditions of the prisoners must be implemented cautiously, gradually, and by taking organized decisions."
"The rational fear now is harming the conditions of the prisoners, which will lead to unifying the [Palestinian] front just as what happened in Operation Guardian of the Walls where the fronts in Gaza, East Al-Quds, and the West Bank were all linked in one battle."
