Second oldest Palestinian prisoner begins 40th year in prison
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Maher Younes is one of the oldest Palestinian prisoners who were incarcerated before the Oslo Accords, which amount to 25 prisoners, half of which are from the 48' territories.
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Palestinian prisoner Maher Younes, who has been serving the second-longest sentence in the occupation's prisons
Palestinian prisoner Maher Younes, who has been serving the longest prison sentence in the Israeli occupation's prisons, has started his 40th year in the Israeli occupation's prisoner; he is currently incarcerated in the Al-Naqab detention center.
The Israeli occupation forces arrested Younes on January 18, 1983, two weeks after arresting his cousin Karim Younes. His arrest took place after the IOF interrogated him, and he was charged by the military judiciary charged him with belonging to Fatah.
The Israeli occupation had first given Maher, alongside his cousins Karim and Sami, over "betrayal of citizenship," and a month later, their sentence was mitigated to be life in prison instead.
After vigorous legal efforts, the Israeli occupation forces set the life sentence for several Palestinian prisoners to 40 years, including Maher Younes.
He was arrested at 23-years-old, and he spent his youth in prison without founding a family. Today, he is prohibited from even meeting his nieces and nephews due to an Israeli occupation law prohibiting him from seeing his extended family.
He had submitted a petition to see his dying father in 2008, which the occupation rejected, leading his father to die without Maher seeing him after decades of being unable to.
Maher Younes had undergone a 10-day-long hunger strike in February 2013 during his stay in Gilboa to shed the light on the sufferance of Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli occupation's prisons, especially those denied participating in prisoner exchange deals.
"Since Maher's arrest in 1983, there has been no prison at whose iron gates I have not stood," his mother said.
His mother, Em Nader, is very sick, and she has been paralyzed, preventing her from visiting her son for over two years. She is impatiently waiting for her son's return home, saying, "My life is meaningless without Maher. I am a prisoner just like him until his confines are broken and we are united without any prison bars nor jailers."
![In a 2021 interview with Frontline by former US special representative James Jeffrey, he says he had "engaged with [HTS] via backchannels while serving in President Trump’s State Department. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Batoul Chamas)](https://alpha-en-media.almayadeen.net/media/image/2024/12/21/b4a69f2e-8682-43e4-9d37-49482b304ab3/3.png?v=2&format=webp "In a 2021 interview with Frontline by former US special representative James Jeffrey, he says he had \"engaged with [HTS] via backchannels while serving in President Trump’s State Department. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Batoul Chamas)")
