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News Release Archive | Palestinian Prisoners | Accuracy.Org

Palestinian Hunger Strikers: “Fighting Ingrained Duplicity”

May 15, 2012

Reuters is reporting: “Standing up to Israel through non-violent resistance can produce encouraging results, Palestinians said on Tuesday, after a prisoner hunger strike produced some Israeli concessions.

“The deal under which some 1,600 Palestinian prisoners agreed on Monday to end a month-long fast against Israel’s prison policy was struck on the eve of Nakba (catastrophe) Day…”

ALLAM JARRAR, via Ryme Katkhouda, rymepmc at gmail.com; Kinda Mohamadieh, kinda.mohamadieh at annd.org
Jarrar is with the Palestinian NGO Network. He is in Washington, D.C. with a delegation of the Arab NGO Network for Development, which also includes representatives from Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Tunisia, Yemen and other Arab countries. The delegation just released a paper, “Overview and Suggestions for Improving Key Areas in U.S. Foreign Policy Towards the Arab Region.” Point one is “The centrality of recognizing the Palestinian rights to democratic and development processes.”

NOURA ERAKAT, nourae at mac.com; RICHARD FALK, rfalk at princeton.edu
Erakat is an adjunct professor of international human rights law in the Middle East at Georgetown University and the U.S.-based legal advocacy consultant for the Badil Center for Palestinian Refugee and Residency Rights. She is also a contributing editor to Jadaliyya.com.

Available for a limited number of interviews, Falk is professor of international law emeritus, Princeton University and Special Rapporteur on Occupied Palestinian Territories for the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Erakat said today: “It is empowering that on the day of the 64th commemoration of the Nakba, or the day that marks the initial displacement and dispossession of Palestinians, that Thaer Halahleh and Bilal Diab will be ending their hunger strike in exchange for their freedom. As a result of an Egyptian-brokered deal between Israelis and Palestinians, all the hunger strikers will end their strike upon Israel’s vow to not renew their arbitrary detention without charge or trial upon its expiration. This marks a significant milestone in the struggle against colonial violence in Palestine. It does not however, signal an end to the struggle as demonstrated by the case of Hana al-Shalabi who spent two years in administrative detention before obtaining her release as part of the Hamas-brokered prisoner exchange only to be re-arreseted two months later. A definitive end to these punitive and racist practices necessitates the political will of international governments and agencies who have the ability to exert the requisite pressure upon Israel to comply with international law and human rights norms.”

Falk and Erakat recently wrote the piece “Palestinian Hunger Strikers: Fighting Ingrained Duplicity,” which states: “On his seventy-third day of hunger strike, Thaer Halahleh was vomiting blood, bleeding from his lips and gums, while his body weighs in at 121 pounds—a fraction of its pre-hunger strike size. The thirty-three-year-old Palestinian follows the still-palpable footsteps of Adnan Khader and Hana Shalabi whose hunger strikes resulted in release. He also stands alongside Bilal Diab who is also entering his seventy-third day of visceral protest. Together, they inspired nearly 2,500 Palestinian political prisoners to go on hunger strike in protest of Israel’s policy of indefinite detention without charge or trial.

“Administrative detention has constituted a core of Israel’s 1,500 occupation laws that apply to Palestinians only, and which are not subject to any type of civilian or public review. Derived from British Mandate laws, administrative detention permits Israeli Forces to arrest Palestinians for up to six months without charge or trial, and without any show of incriminating evidence. Such detention orders can be renewed indefinitely, each time for another six-month term.

“Ayed Dudeen is one of the longest-serving detainees in Israeli captivity. First arrested in October 2007, Israeli officials renewed his detention thirty times without charge or trial. After languishing in a prison cell for nearly four years without due process, prison authorities released him in August 2011 only to re-arrest him two weeks later. His wife Amal no longer tells their six children that their father is coming home, because, in her words, ‘I do not want to give them false hope anymore, I just hope that this nightmare will go away.’”

See recent New York Times report: “Palestinians Go Hungry to Make Their Voices Heard”

Tagged With: Allam Jarrar, Bilal Diab, Israel, Middle East, Nakba, Noura Erakat, Palestine, Palestinian Hunger Strike, Palestinian Prisoners, Richard Falk, Thaer Halahleh,

End of a Palestinian Hunger Strike Sheds Light on “Lawless Captivity”

February 22, 2012

AP reports: “A Palestinian prisoner agreed to end his 66-day hunger strike to protest his imprisonment without charge after reaching a deal with Israel that will free him in April, the Israeli Justice Ministry said Tuesday.”

RICHARD FALK, rfalk at princeton.edu
Just back in the U.S. from the Mideast, Falk is available for a limited number of interviews. He is the UN special rapporteur on Palestinian human rights and just wrote the piece “Saving Khader Adnan’s Life and Legacy,” which states: “It is a great relief to those millions around the world who were moved to prayer and action by Khader Adnan’s extraordinary hunger strike of 66 days that has ended due to Israel’s agreement to release him on April 17. …

“While it is appropriate to celebrate this ending of the strike as ‘a victory,’ there are several disturbing features that deserve comment. To call an arrangement that saved someone’s life a ‘deal,’ as the media consistently put it, is itself demeaning, and reveals at the very least a failure to appreciate the gravity and deep dedication of purpose that is bound up with such a nonviolent form of resistance.

“Similarly, the carelessness of the initial reactions was notable, often referring to Mr. Adnan’s ‘release’ when in fact he will be still held in administrative detention for several more weeks, and could conceivably be confined much longer, should Israeli military authorities unilaterally decide that “substantial evidence” against him emerges in this period immediately ahead. It should be noted that on matters of principle, Israel gave not an inch: even in relation to Mr. Adnan, he will remain in captivity and will be subject to the “legal” possibility that his period of imprisonment could be extended indefinitely; beyond this, Israeli authorities conceded no intention whatsoever to review the cases of the 309 other Palestinians who are presently being held under the administrative detention procedure. …

“What was entirely missing from the Israeli public discourse was some expression of compassion, even if only for the family of Mr. Adnan, which consists of two daughters of four years or younger and his articulate pregnant wife, Randa. There was not even the slightest show of respect for the dignity of Mr. Adnan’s long hunger strike or sympathy for the acute suffering that accompanies such a determined foregoing of food for an extended period.

“Instead, the Israeli commentary that was at all favorable to the arrangement stressed purely pragmatic factors. It was one more lost opportunity for Israelis of all shades of opinion to reach across the abyss of political conflict to affirm a common humanity. In contrast, the spokesperson for the Netanyahu government, Mark Regev, was only interested in deflecting criticism aimed at Israel. He parried criticism by cynically observing that other governments use administrative detention in the name of security, including the United States, and that the legality of Israel’s use of administrative detention should not be questioned as it depends on a 1946 law enacted when Britain was controlling Palestine, implying not inaccurately that Israel was the ‘colonial’ successor to the British! …

“A fitting tribute to Mr. Adnan’s hunger strike would be to put opposition to administrative detention on the top of the human rights agenda throughout the world. We should begin by refusing to use the phrase ‘administrative detention,’ rechristening it as ‘administrative torture’ or ‘lawless captivity.’”

Falk is Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and Visiting Distinguished Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has authored and edited numerous publications spanning a period of five decades, most recently editing the volume “International Law and the Third World: Reshaping Justice.”

See “Pundits Waiting for a Palestinian Gandhi? Meet Khader Adnan” by Peter Hart.

Tagged With: Israel, Middle East, Palestine, Palestinian Hunger Strike, Palestinian Prisoners, Richard Falk,