Thirty Palestinian prisoners are continuing their hunger strike to end administrative detention, imprisonment without charge or trial, as the prisoners’ movement as a whole has acted to show solidarity and stand with the strikers. They are now on their 14th day of hunger strike, which they launched on 25 September. Zakaria Zubaidi, one of the six heroes of the Freedom Tunnel, who liberated themselves from the infamous Gilboa prison in September 2021, announced he would go on a five-day hunger strike in solidarity with the striking detainees fighting to end detention without charge or trial.
This comes after 900 prisoners in Ofer prisons returned their meals on Thursday, 6 October in solidarity with the hunger strikers, all of whom are jailed without charge or trial. They are among approximately 800 Palestinians held under administrative detention out of 4,650 total Palestinian prisoners in Israeli occupation jails. As the prisoners’ movement behind bars has escalated its solidarity with the 30 strikers, so too have people throughout Palestine and around the world.
Nidal Abu Aker, one of the strikers and a leader in Dheisheh refugee camp, sent a message from his prison cell to his daughter on the occasion of her engagement:
“With the finest and most tender human feelings that fill my soul to bring back memories o our journey with all the love, joy and happiness that we have made together, and at the same time, pain, sorrows and separation from our loved ones by the fascist enemy, which believes that it can kill our dreams, joy and happiness that reach and embrace the sky.
I am addressing you from my cell as I and my comrades are waging a battle of empty stomachs, demanding our right to freedom and claiming the joy that we snatch from the teeth of the colonizers. We believe that our happiness lies in the struggle to break our chains and put an end to the arbitrary, immoral policy of administrative detention.
How beautiful it is to share our joy and happiness in the engagement of Dalia and Haitham! How beautiful is your embrace of and support for them! I feel as if I am present among you despite my enforced absence, through my friends and family, close and extended. I look forward to continuing our joy with Dalia and Haitham, as we celebrated for Mohammed’s graduation after years of imprisonment, and for Carmel, who is about to graduate from university. She inspires hope in the soul, a model of giving, a symbol of the camp and its luminous future.
My strength during this battle of empty stomachs is strengthened by you. You are my family, the people of the camp, and all of my friends. You are the compass that I follow, the seed of growth in the earth. The oppression of the occupiers will not prevent us from singing, joy and love.
We have all the joy, we have a future that will be bright, without the colonizers. And here I recall the words of the leftist Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, ‘Our enemies can cut all the roses, but they will never be the masters of spring.’ I congratulate you, dearest Dalia, I congratulate you, Haitham and your beloved family, I am sure that happiness will always be our companion. My love, sincere greetings and warm kisses to all of you.”
There is an ongoing public sit-in organized by the Palestinian national forces in Dheisheh refugee camp. On Friday, 7 October, a letter from Ghassan Zawahreh, another long-term leader in Dheisheh camp, was read out to the gathering:
“In these days, previous strikes, names and images pass through my mind. I see my comrades on strike, I remember the story of each one of them. I see all the details that others do not see, I see their aches, pains and suffering. I see their bodies losing weight daily, and those aches that cannot be assuaged except by their will. The merciless aches of their bodies, headaches, and general emaciation, and even the sound of pain that emits from their bones, which I can almost hear, even though I am at this spatial distance from them. I see all those details in their aches and pains, but it is a fleeting picture, which soon goes away. In its place is occupied by another image, the image of the fighter and the resistance struggler, the revolutionary.
The image of will, steadfastness and defiance, which does not fade. These men refuse simply follow the current, but rather form and make the current themselves. I see them and tell you all, that their real pain is not the hunger strike, nor all their pain, aches, and atrophy of their bodies, in this battle they are waging. Indeed, I see them happy more than ever, because they raise their voices high.”
Palestinians in Gaza rallied in a large march on Saturday, 8 October in support of the prisoners on hunger strike, demanding their release in a rally organized by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
This came alongside multiple gatherings in the refugee camps in Lebanon and Syria as well as rallies and actions in Berlin, Vancouver, Toulouse, Paris, New York City and elsewhere around the world. The Bahrain Society for Resisting Normalization with the Zionist Entity held a solidarity event to support the prisoners in Zionist jails on hunger strike on 8 October.
There are currently approximately 800 Palestinian prisoners jailed under administrative detention orders out of a total of approximately 4,650 total Palestinian prisoners in occupation jails. Administrative detention was first introduced to Palestine by the British colonial mandate before being adopted by the Zionist project. Detention orders can be issued for up to six months at a time on the basis of “secret evidence” denied to both the detainee and their lawyer. These orders are indefinitely renewable, with many Palestinians spending years at a time jailed under administrative detention, and neither they nor their families and communities are ever sure when they will be released, an additional form of collective punishment and psychological torture.
The first 30 administrative detainees who began the strike are listed below, with additional prisoners scheduled to join in the battle as it continues. They include community leaders like Nidal Abu Aker and Ghassan Zawahreh, who have spent years in administrative detention; French-Palestinian lawyer and human rights defender Salah Hammouri, student organizers like Zaid Qaddoumi, and a number of others:
1. Nidal Abu Aker, 54, of Dheisheh refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 1 August 2022.
2. Ehab Masoud, 50, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 17 October 2021.
3. Asim Al Kaabi, 44, of Balata refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 24 August 2022.
4. Ahmed Hajjaj, 44, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 24 August 2022.
5. Thaer Taha, 43, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 1 May 2022.
6. Rami Fadayel, 43, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 5 September 2022.
7. Lotfi Salah, 43, of Bethlehem
8. Salah Hammouri, 37, of Jerusalem, imprisoned without charge or trial since 7 March 2022.
9. Ghassan Zawahreh, 40, of Dheisheh refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial since 19 August 2022.
10. Kanaan Kanaan, 30, of Hizma, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 3 August 2022.
11. Ashraf Abu Aram, 36, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 7 June 2021.
12. Ghassan Karajah, 32, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 11 August 2022.
13. Saleh Abu Alia, 32, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 4 March 2022.
14. Awad Kanaan, 32, of Hizma, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 2 February 2022.
15. Leith Kassaberah, 31, of Beit Anan, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 1 February 2022
16. Saleh Al-Jaidi, 30, of Dheisheh refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 4 August 2022.
17. Basil Mezher, 29, of Dheisheh refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 12 November 2021.
18. Majd Al-Khawaja, 28, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 14 June 2022.
19. Jihad Shreiteh, 28, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 8 May 2022.
20. Haitham Siyaj, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 3 November 2021.
21. Mustafa Al-Hasanat, 29, of Bethlehem, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 3 February 2022.
22. Azmi Shreiteh al Barghouthi, 23, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 8 May 2022.
23. Muhammad Abu Ghazi, 22, of Arroub refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 13 March 2022.
24. Ahmed Al-Kharouf, 22 of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 13 June 2022.
25. Nasrallah Barghouti, 22 of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention.
26. Muhammad Fuqaha, 22, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 15 March 2022.
27. Tamer Al-Hajouj, 22, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 15 March 2022.
28. Raghad Shamroukh, of Dheisheh refugee camp, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 12 September 2022.
29. Zaid Qaddoumi, of Beit Jala, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 16 September 2022.
30. Senar Hamad, 20, of Ramallah, imprisoned without charge or trial under administrative detention since 18 April 2022.
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network urges all supporters of Palestine and the prisoners’ struggle to join the campaign to end administrative detention and to support these valiant prisoners putting their bodies and lives on the line to resist and struggle for a liberated Palestine, through their hunger strike for freedom.
Download these distributable flyers and posters to highlight the struggle to free Palestinian prisoners:
- Poster/Sign: End Administrative Detention
- Poster/Sign: Free Hunger Strikers and All Prisoners
- Poster/Sign – End Administrative Detention (with Palestinian Flag)
1. Mobilize actions, demonstrations and creative interventions – Take to the streets to defend the Palestinian people and their resistance! As was made clear during the Unity Intifada/Seif al-Quds in May 2021, there is a vast depth of support for the Palestinian people everywhere around the world, including inside the imperialist powers. It is our responsibility to act and make it impossible to continue their support for the crimes against the Palestinian people.
2. Build the boycott of Israel – This is a critical moment to escalate the campaign to isolate the Israeli regime at all levels, including through boycott campaigns that target the occupation’s economic exploitation of the Palestinian land, people and resources as well as those international corporations, like HP and G4S, that profit from the ongoing colonization of Palestine.
