Samidoun Netherlands calls on all supporters of Palestine to show their solidarity with the Palestinian hunger striker Hisham Abu Hawash on Thursday, January 6, 2022 at 3:00 PM at Plein 40-’45 in Amsterdam.
Hisham Abu Hawash will be on hunger strike for 143 days on January 6. He launched his hunger strike in protest against his administrative detention by the Israeli occupation – incarceration without charge or trial.
Abu Hawash is a 40-year-old Palestinian, married, and the father of five children (Hadi, Mohammed, Izz al-Din, Waqas and Saba). During his hunger strike, Abu Hawash was transferred several times from Ramle Prison Clinic – which is known to Palestinian prisoners as a site of medical neglect – to local hospitals.
The occupation has waited until December 26 to suspend Abu Hawash’s administrative detention. This ensures that Abu Hawash can receive his family and supporters from Palestine ’48. However, he is not allowed to leave the hospital and cannot be transferred to a Palestinian hospital. Therefore, Abu Hawash remains a prisoner of the Israeli occupier.
Abu Hawash has been jailed without charge or trial since 27 October 2020, with his detention repeatedly extended. While his legal appeals have been repeatedly dismissed, his detention was once again extended for four months while he was on hunger strike. The Israeli occupation also refused to confirm that it would not be renewed again. In multiple arrests, he has spent 8 years in total in Israeli occupation prisons, 52 months of that time without charge or trial under administrative detention.
Abu Hawash’s case exemplifies exactly why over 500 Palestinians jailed without charge or trial under administrative detention have announced that they will launch a collective boycott of the Israeli military courts and appeals courts beginning on 1 January 2022, as the court system only gives a veneer of legitimacy to an illegitimate regime. In total, there are more than 4,500 Palestinian political prisoners in occupation prisons.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network urges all supporters of Palestine to take action to save the life of Hisham Abu Hawash and support all Palestinian prisoners struggling for freedom, for their own lives and for the Palestinian people. He is confronting the system of Israeli oppression on the front lines, his life and health at risk at every moment, to bring the system of administrative detention to an end. Organize actions to support Abu Hawash and his fellow political prisoners, including during the Week of Action to Free Ahmad Sa’adat and all Palestinian Prisoners from 15-22 January 2022.
Administrative detention – like the entire Israeli prison system – is a colonial weapon designed to attack the Palestinian resistance and isolate the leaders of the struggle from the Palestinian people. End administrative detention; free all Palestinian prisoners!
