Palestinian Prisoners Pursue Open-Ended Hunger Strike In Protest Against Appalling Detention Conditions

Some hunger-striking Palestinians have been transferred from their cells to special wings in Israeli prisons for so-called medical supervision owing to their dire health condition, according to informed sources.

After 37 days, over 1,800 Palestinian prisoners are still on a hunger strike to protest against the inhumane and bleak detention conditions, they have experiencing for years in Israeli jails.

The Palestinian prisoners seek better conditions, including more family visits and a halt to ill-treatment through this hunger strike movement which is part of a “battle for freedom and dignity”. 

The callous Israeli authorities doggedly refuse to negotiate, thus trampling underfoot all basic humanitarian principles.

The latter refused to provide details about strike organizer Marwan Barghouti, the best-known prisoner, who is considered a possible future Palestinian leader.

Earlier this week, Barghouti’s lawyer said after a prison visit that his client would soon refuse drinking water. It remains unclear if Barghouti, who has been held arbitrarily in isolation since the April 17 start of the strike, has stopped drinking.

Sources said Marwan Barghouti, a leader in Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement, remains in his cell.

They added that since last week, several sick hunger strikers have been transferred to special prison wings with medical staff.

Two prisoners have been hospitalized because of their critical health condition due to the protracted hunger strike.

Meanwhile, Palestinians in the West Bank staged protests against what they perceive as indifference by the international community toward the valiant Palestinian hunger strikers.

On Wednesday, dozens of activists and relatives of prisoners blocked the entrance to a U.N. Compound in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah for two hours.

“We came here to deliver a message that the U.N. needs to play its bounden role in protecting our sons who are slowly dying in Zionist jails,” said Majdi Ziadeh, the father of a Palestinian prisoner.

The International Committee of the Red Cross, which visits the hunger strikers, has also been taken at task by Palestinians, who feel frustrated by the organization’s refusal to discuss the burning issue in public.

The Red Cross closed its office in Ramallah on Tuesday evening after an angry crowd forced its way in. 

Israel now holds about 6,500 Palestinian prisoners in horrendous detention conditions. Several hundred Palestinians are being held illegally without any charges or trial, in harsh administrative detention.