Two Palestinian prisoners remain on hunger strike

Two Palestinian prisoners, Hamza Marwan Bouzia, 27, and Salah Khawaja, 50, remain on hunger strike in protest of their administrative detention, imprisonment without charge or trial, on 15 November. Two more Palestinian prisoners, Bajis Nakhleh, 52, and Hassan Hassanein Shokeh, 29, suspended their hunger strikes on Tuesday evening, 14 November.

Shokeh, 29, spent 35 days on hunger strike without food in protest of his imprisonment without charge or trial. He was seized by Israeli occupation forces on 29 September, less than one month after being released from prison on 31 August. His lawyer, Ahlam Haddad, said that he suspended his strike after the Israeli military prosecution directed him to be indicted in military court rather than be held under administrative detention. From Bethlehem, he is held in the Ramle prison clinic.

Nakhleh, 52, from Jalazone refugee camp near Ramallah, suspended his strike when he was moved to Ofer prison from the Etzion interrogation center. He had launched his strike on 8 November, when he was seized by occupation forces who invaded his family home.

Bouzia, 27, from Kifl Hares in Salfit, has been on hunger strike for 24 days demanding his release from administrative detention without charge or trial, while Khawaja, from Nil’in, is protesting the renewal of his administrative detention only one day before he was to be released.

Bouzia and Khawaja are among over 450 Palestinians imprisoned without charge or trial under indefinitely renewable administrative detention orders. Many Palestinians have spent years at a time jaile under these orders, and ending administrative detention has been a demand of Palestinian hunger strikers continuously for years.