Middle East Monitor / March 27, 2023
Israel is currently holding 967 Palestinians in prison with neither charge nor trial, Haaretz revealed on Sunday. The Israeli daily pointed out that this is the largest number of Palestinian prisoners held under so-called administrative detention for twenty years.
Data about the detainees was provided by the Israeli occupation army to a local rights group. It confirmed that the total number of administrative detainees is 971, of which 967 are Palestinians from the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Palestine occupied in 1948 (Israel). Ninety per cent of the administrative detention orders were approved by military courts, the army confirmed.
Administrative detention is a leftover from the British Mandate occupation era. Detainees are held without charge or trial for six-monthly periods which are renewable endlessly solely on the basis of secret evidence that neither detainees nor their lawyers are shown. Israel is one of the very few countries to use such a system.
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Israel: Palestinian hunger striker’s health deteriorates
Middle East Monitor / March 27, 2023
The health of Palestinian hunger striker Sheikh Khader Adnan, 44, has deteriorated seriously as he enters the fifty-first day of his protest against his administrative detention in an Israeli prison, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club said on Sunday.
Adnan is from Arraba village near Jenin. He launched his hunger strike immediately after he was arrested by the Israeli occupation forces on 5 February, since when he has been held in solitary confinement. He is reported to have been deprived of blankets and warm clothes despite the cold winter weather in what is described as an official act of retaliation for his hunger strike.
Due to the deterioration of his health, he has now been moved to the clinic in Ramleh Prison, but is still being kept in very harsh conditions. A spokesperson for Muhjat al-Quds Foundation, Tamer Za’anin, said that Adnan is suffering from pain throughout his body and blurred vision, in addition to vomiting.
The father of nine — his youngest is just 18 months old — has been detained by the Israeli occupation authorities twelve times and has spent eight years in Israeli jails, mostly in administrative detention. An Israeli military court was scheduled to hold a hearing of his case on 7 March, but it was postponed for the fourth time to 4 April in what appears to be another attempt to break his hunger strike.
