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Free the #Filton6, Free Palestine Action Political Prisoners!

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network joins our comrades in Palestine Action and the broad movement for Palestinian liberation in demanding the release of the Filton 6 and all Palestine Action political prisoners held in British jails.

Since 6 August, six actionists are being detained under the Terrorism Act (2000), which allows British police to hold them for 7 days with no charges. As onf 11 August, three more actionists were seized by the police and are being detained under the same provisions. Activists are rallying beginning at 4 pm British time at the Newbury Police Station in Newbury and the Hammersmith Police Station in London to demand the immediate release of all of the detainees.

The #Filton6 were arrested on Tuesday, 6 August for entering infamous Zionist war profiteer Elbit Systems’ Filton, Bristol site in order to stop its manufacture of weaponry for genocide. The action at the Filton site made use of a repurposed prison van — specifically in honour of and solidarity with Palestinian prisoners in Zionist jails and military camps struggling for freedom — to enter the premises.

Britain is now and has consistently been a partner in the Zionist colonization and genocide throughout Palestine, from the Balfour Declaration of 1917 seeking to provide the Zionist movement with a “Jewish national home” in occupied Palestine, to the British colonial mandate of Palestine that included the assassination and imprisonment of Palestinian leaders and strugglers in intifada after intifada, to the ongoing British arming and funding of the Zionist regime. As an imperialist power and part of the US-led imperialist camp internationally, it is a leading force in the alliance of genocide, bombing Yemen while participating in the assault on Gaza. In this context, it is further worth noting that the British colonial mandate was the first to introduce “administrative detention” — imprisonment without charge or trial — to occupied Palestine, a policy enthusiastically adopted by their Zionist colonial successors, currently used to detain nearly 4,000 of the nearly 10,000 Palestinian political prisoners held hostage in Zionist jails.

The actions undertaken by the Palestine Actionists are not only justified but necessary amid the ongoing genocide in occupied Palestine. Elbit Systems produces 85% of the drones used by the Zionist regime to carry out its genocidal assault, and putting an end to genocide is a moral, political and legal obligation of all people of conscience.

In May, Palestinian students in Gaza further called: “Today, we call on you, from the midst of massacres and siege, to a new revolutionary phase of comprehensive escalation, and to raise the pace and ceiling of your struggle and your honorable stances, quantitatively and qualitatively, against the institutions, corporations, and governments that participate in the slaughter of our children, our students, and our people in Rafah, Jabalia, Khan Younis, and the entire Gaza Strip, and against the settler gangs, armies of Zionist killers, and so on that commit their crimes in camps, cities and villages in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.”

We demand the immediate release of the #Filton6 and all other prisoners for Palestinian liberation held in British and other imperialist jails. Thousands of people have been arrested, detained and jailed by police in Britain, France, Germany, the United States and Canada in the past 10 months of genocide. These repressive attacks on the movement for Palestinian liberation are part and parcel of these imperialist powers’ participation in the genocide in Gaza and seek to repress the growing, massive international movement in support of Palestinian resistance and liberation from the river to the sea.

We urge not only the immediate liberation of these prisoners, but also echo the call from the students of Palestine for broad and comprehensive escalation to confront the Zionist war machine everywhere, particularly in the heart of the imperial core.

Freedom for the Filton 6 and all prisoners of the Palestinian cause! 

From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free! 

We are republishing the statement from Palestine Action below:

Actionists are being detained under the Terrorism Act, allowing the police to hold them for up to 7 days, with possible extension to 14 days, without charge. This comes after six were arrested on Tuesday 6th August for entering Elbit Systems’ Filton, Bristol site, to prevent its manufacture of weapons for genocide.

The Filton premises are the brand new £35m R&D hub of Israel’s biggest weapons firm. Its June 2023 opening was attended by the UK-Israeli Ambassador Hotevely, and Elbit’s CEO Bezhalel Machlis – who has frequently boasted of the company’s central role in Israel’s military, during the ongoing Gaza genocide.

Direct action against Elbit aims to disrupt this: targeting the source of colonial violence and genocide against the Palestinian people, undermining Elbit’s profiteering from Israel’s daily massacres.

As well as detaining them under unprecedented powers, police have launched a smear campaign against the detained actionists, alleging violence against police and security guards. The activists are unable to respond to these claims, and unable to describe for public record the force used against them by police and private security. Palestine Action contends that these statements are designed to prejudice opinion and legal proceedings against activists, and to lay the groundwork for the police’s unjust use of authoritarian powers.

Now, more than ever, Palestine Action and the #Filton6 need the support of the public, to push back against these authoritarian attempts to protect Israel’s weapons industry. Show the British state and Israeli arms companies that we refuse to be intimidated into allowing a genocide to happen.

Here are three things you can do to support:

  • Mobilise from 4PM on Sunday 11th August outside Hammersmith police station, W6 7NX or Newbury police station, RG14 5QU
  • Share this statement or publish your own
  • Visualise your support for the #Filton6 and Palestine Action either at protests or by sharing a picture with a sign saying ‘I stand with the #Filton6’ on social media

The martyrdom of Wafa Jarrar: A life of dedication cut short by Zionist attack and medical neglect

On Monday, 5 August, Wafa Jarrar, 50, was martyred in Jenin, dying of her injuries caused by the colonial occupation Zionist army when they invaded her home two months earlier on 21 May, abducting her and throwing her into a military jeep when an explosion in the jeep severely injured her legs. The Zionist military then took her to the hospital, where both of her legs were amputated at the thighs, without seeking her consent or that of her family. Her husband, Abdel-Jabbar Jarrar, has been imprisoned since February; he is jailed without charge or trial under administrative detention.

 

Despite her severe injuries, she was initially ordered to 4 months in administrative detention, imprisonment without charge or trial. However, in order so as not to be held responsible for her health condition, the occupation forces released her 10 days later, on 30 May. During that time, her family was told that she was in a coma in a Zionist hospital, and also deliberately misled her family by providing incomplete and misleading information about her health condition at some times, while blocking all information at other times.

Upon her release, she was transferred to the intensive care unit at Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin in critical condition. Her doctors found that she suffered from fractures of her rib cage, a fracture of the 12th vertebra of the spine as well as the amputation of her legs; her left lung was also infected due to an accumulation of blood inside it. Although she remained in intensive care, her severe injuries led to further ulcers and infections. She received additional surgery and antibiotics, but her condition continued to worsen until she passed away on 5 August.

The occupation retained Wafa Jarrar’s amputated legs, refusing to return them to the family to bury with the rest of her body, instead saying they were “discarded,” in offense to Islamic funeral traditions.

Wafa Nayef Zuhdi Jarrar (Umm Hudhayfah) was born in 1974 in the northern West Bank city of Jenin, Palestine. She married Abdel Jabbar Muhammad Ahmed Jarrar, a leader of the Hamas movement, on February 22, 1990, and they had four children, Hudhayfah, Taqwa, Amjad and Zaytouna.

A well-known and beloved activist and educator, she was the coordinator of the Association of Families of Martyrs and Prisoners of Jenin Governorate. She was widely respected in the city of Jenin in particular and in the cities of the West Bank in general and was known for her committed participation in solidarity vigils demanding the liberation of the prisoners and the return of the bodies of the martyrs held by the Zionist state.

In 2021, she was a candidate on the Hamas list in the legislative elections, Jerusalem is Our Promise, before the Palestinian Authority canceled the elections.

She also held a bachelor’s degree in Arabic language teaching methods and completed her master’s degree in Arabic language at An-Najah University.

Wafa Jarrar’s husband, Abdul Jabbar Jarrar, is an organizer in the resistance movement in Jenin Governorate. At a young age, he participated in protests against the occupation forces and was active in the Islamic Bloc while studying at Al Khalil University. He joined the Hamas movement immediately after its founding in 1987. In total, he was arrested 30 times and spent about 16 years in Zionist prisons.

He has been in administrative detention since last February. On 5 August, only hours after the announcement of his wife’s martyrdom, the occupation forces declared that they were renewing his administrative detention was renewed for 6 additional months. (Administrative detention orders are indefinitely renewable.)

A huge crowd accompanied Wafa Jarrar’s funeral procession in Jenin, accompanying the martyr one last time. In other cities in occupied Palestine, rallies and initiatives in her honour were organized, including at Bir Zeit University, where student organizations marched, carrying her portrait.

Saadia Farajallah and Israa Jaabis: two precedents of this policy of deliberate medical negligence

This policy of deliberate medical neglect has already caused death and serious injury among Palestinian female prisoners, the two most egregious recent examples being those of Saadia Farajallah and Israa Jaabis.

Saadia Farajallah was arrested on December 18, 2021, while she was passing through the city of Al Khalil to visit her daughter. The colonial army accused the 68-year-old woman of attempting to stab a 38-year-old settler from the illegal settlement of “Kiryat Arba” in front of the Ibrahimi Mosque. Attacked by a group of settlers and held at gunpoint by Zionist soldiers, she was violently taken to an interrogation center. From the time of her arrest until her martyrdom, her family was prevented from visiting her.

On July 2, 2022, while performing her ablutions in the colonial prison of Damon, Saadia Farajallah lost consciousness. She was carried by her fellow prisoners to the prison clinic where she would fall a martyr.

Her condition deteriorated very quickly after her arrest. At her trial she appeared in a wheelchair, unable to walk. During the hearing, her lawyers demanded that she be given access to a specialist doctor, as she was clearly already suffering from health problems. Instead of receiving the medical care she needed, the military court sentenced her to 5 years in prison and a fine of 15,000 shekels. It was this policy of deliberate medical neglect in the colonial prisons that caused her martyrdom, as it caused the martyrdom of Walid Daqqah, Khaled Al Shawish, Nasser Abu Hmeid, Khader Adnan, Asif Al Rifai and many others of the 258 Palestinian prisoners murdered by the Zionist state in its prisons.

Israa Jaabis, an educator and social worker from Jerusalem, was arrested on October 11, 2015. That day, as she was returning home, an electrical fault in her car’s airbag caused a fire as she approached a colonial army checkpoint. While she was trapped in the burning car, a bus driver came to her aid and managed to open the door. Severely burned, she asked for help from the Zionist soldiers who rushed to the scene. But instead, Israa was held face down by the soldiers, while her burns continued to worsen.

15 minutes later, the ambulance arrives but it is too late. Held on the ground by constraint, burned alive, Israa is seriously injured: the educator has suffered first, second and third degree burns on more than 60% of her body. She is transferred to the hospital where she will have eight fingers amputated. Her face is partially disfigured by the burns: her ears are stuck to her head. She has great difficulty breathing through her nose and has serious respiratory problems. She often suffers from major attacks during which she says she feels like she is burning from the inside. Her lower lip having melted, she cannot drink and eat as before, she needs a straw and a special cup because she has great difficulty moving her hands .

She was immediately arrested and placed in detention. At the end of the trial she was sentenced to eleven years in prison and a fine of 50,000 shekels.

Before her accident she worked in a retirement home and used to do activities with the residents. She also volunteered in several associations, in hospitals, schools, etc., where she dressed as a clown to entertain the children.

In prison, her fellow prisoners, who took care of her every day, making sure she lacked nothing and monitoring her condition as best they could, described her as a loving friend full of love and joy, who always welcomed the new prisoners as best as possible. Many spoke of the fact that she worried about each of them and that despite her condition she remained filled with a superhuman strength of character.

Saturday, November 25, thanks to the exchange agreement obtained by the struggle and offensive of the Palestinian Resistance and the immense sacrifice of the population of Gaza, Israa Jaabis was freed from Zionist prisons. That day, in infinite joy, her son, Mu’tasim , who had not been able to see her for more than 6 years, finally welcomed his mother, after a separation that will have left a significant trauma in the family.

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network extends our deepest condolences to the family, loved ones and comrades of Wafa Jarrar, and the Palestinian people as a whole. May she watch over the living and guide their steps along the long path to liberation. May the sweetest rest be granted to her, may the infinite love of her people ease the pain of her loved ones. Glory to the martyrs, liberation for the prisoners, victory for the resistance, in a free Palestine from the river to the sea.

Dismantle Damon: Free the ReSisters!

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network endorses the new campaign, Dismantle Damon: Free the ReSisters! We urge all to follow the campaign at https://instagram.com/dismantle_damon, join in campaign activities and share news and materials widely! 

DISMANTLE DAMON : FREE THE RESISTERS!

August 3, the International Day in Solidarity with Gaza and the Prisoners, marks 300 days since the start of the US-Europe backed Zionist genocide on Gaza. In answer to the calls from Palestine to mobilize for Gaza and the prisoners we launch a new campaign:

Dismantle Damon: Free the ReSisters.

In this campaign, our demands are simple: we call for the destruction of Damon prison, we call for the freedom of all the Palestinian women* prisoners held there. While in this campaign we focus on Damon prison and its detainees, we also call for every colonial prison to be destroyed and for every Palestinian prisoner to be free.

The Zionist practice of imprisonment has intensified since October 7. Mass kidnappings have been occurring across the West Bank and 48 Palestine, with the number of prisoners in the Zionist prisons currently at over 9,300 and many more thousands of prisoners in concentration camps in Gaza. The systematic use of torture, isolation and sexual assault (regardless of gender) is a normalised practice by the IOF.

Just last week when Zionist media itself reported of use of rape as weapon of war used by their military, and in response to this we saw crowds of settlers take to the streets in support of this criminal practice. The regime of imprisonment of Palestinians and their mistreatment is an attempt to undermine the Palestinian resistance, to rob it of its leadership and to deter others from continuing the struggle. But this will never succeed, the resistance will continue until every prisoner is free, until every inch of Palestine is liberated from Zionism and return becomes a lived reality.

Currently in Damon, which has historically being used as a central prison for Palestinainian women* and girls there are 88 prisoners, including Khalida Jarrar, Hadeel Shatara, Hanan Barghouti and Layan Kayed to name a few. The prisoners are from all sectors of society, they are teachers, students, journalists, mothers, community leaders, lawyers, healthcare workers and so on.

The oppressive practices inside the prison have become even more harsh and inhumane, the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs has been reporting on the worsening conditions inside the Zionist occupation jails. Many rights the prisoners have fought for, such as cooking their own meals, conducting education, and family visitation, have been banned and lawyers barely have access to their clients. The prisoners are isolated from the outside world with cell phones, radios and televisions confiscated. They are being kept hungry, subjected to isolation and solitary confinement, beatings from the prison guards, threats of abuse and threats to their families.

Upon her release, Baraa Odeh reflected with us on the harsh treatment, torture and humiliation the prisoners are subjected to, yet she assured us that they remain steadfast, in the spirit of Palestinian resistance.

A similar reflection was shared by former prisoner and long time resistor Etaf Alayan – in June , the International Women’s Alliance (IWA) honoured Etaf at with their Women of Valour Award for her steadfast resistance both inside and outside of Zionist prison. In her acceptance message she greeted all the women prisoners “the free women of Palestine, who are still being tortured but remain unsilenced”.

As activists, organizers, as people of conscience in solidarity with Palestine it is our task to uplift and advocate for our prisoners, our leadership, and our compass in the Palestinian liberation struggle.

In this campaign we strive to highlight every prisoner in Damon prison, to share their stories and to amplify their struggle. We do not seek justice or their liberation through illegitimate Zionist courts, we know the freedom of the prisoners and the end of Zionist colonial prisons can only come with the complete liberation of Palestine, from the river to the sea. We call on all those who stand for justice and liberation to join the campaign.

In the coming weeks we will release publish more extensively on the campaign, prisoner profiles, resources, calls to action and how you can become involved.

Free our reSisters!

Free all Palestinian prisoners!

Free Palestine from the river to the sea!

Long live the Palestinian Resistance!

Video: Palestinian Prisoners, Genocide, and Repression of Pro-Palestinian Organizations

On Thursday, August 1, Charlotte Kates, Samidoun’s international coordinator, joined Millennials Are Killing Capitalism Live to discuss the current situation of Palestinian prisoners, the Sde Teiman military concentration camp and the severe torture and abuse of Palestinian prisoners, the assassination of Palestinian national leader and chair of the Hamas political bureau Ismail Haniyeh, the regional resistance alliance, and the importance of coming out on August 3 for the prisoners and Gaza, noting that the call for participation was Haniyeh’s final full political statement, as well as political repression targeting the movement for Palestine.

Watch the full video here:

3 August, Toronto: Fundraiser and Letter Writing for Palestinian Prisoners

Join us to commemorate August 3, the 300th day of escalated genocide in Gaza, as an international day of action for the liberation of Palestine and all Palestinian prisoners!

This Saturday from 2-6PM at York University’s Vari Hall, we will hear directly from Palestinian ex-prisoners, write letters, and collect donations for Palestinian prisoners.

We at Samidoun Toronto, Students & Workers for the Liberation of Palestine, and the Jewish Anti-Zionist Collective Toronto look forward to learning, organizing, and mobilizing with you.

In solidarity,
SamidounTO, JAZCto, and SWLP TO.

You can find Samidoun Toronto on Telegram at t.me/SamidounTO, SWLP TO on Instagram @SWLP_TO and JAZCto on Telegram at t.me/jazcto!

31 July, Vancouver: Emergency Vigil – Confront Genocide and Assassination

VANCOUVER: ALL OUT FOR PALESTINE, IRAN, IRAQ, YEMEN, LEBANON

CONFRONT GENOCIDE AND ASSASSINATION

Wednesday, July 31, 2024
4 pm to 8 pm
Vancouver Art Gallery

Join us for salah, dua, speeches. Open invitation for people to pay their respects to the martyrs of Palestine and the region.

Zionist forces bombed Beirut today, attempting to assassinate a leader in the Lebanese resistance; they then assassinated Palestinian leader Ismail Haniyeh through a brazen attack on Iran, where Haniyeh was attending the inauguration of the newly elected President.

This outrageous crime, part of the systemic assassination policy of the Zionist regime, aims to target the Palestinian people as a whole, and to target the entire region for aggression in an attempt to manufacture consent for war on Iran. The Zionist regime also once again indicated that it intends to continue the genocide, specifically targeting the lead negotiator for the Palestinian Resistance.

Join us in a collective emergency vigil to honour the martyrs. Share in our collective outrage and our commitment to end the genocide, end the assassination policy, and make it clear that their assassinations will never kill Palestine or the Palestinian people.

Glory to the martyr: Ismail Haniyeh, Palestinian leader, assassinated in Zionist attack

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network joins the entire Palestinian national movement in condemning the assassination, mourning the martyrdom and saluting the life of the leader, Ismail Haniyeh, Abu al-Abed, the chair of the Political Bureau of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, in Tehran, Iran. 

Haniyeh was in Iran to attend the inauguration of newly elected Iranian president Masoud Pezeshkian and also met with Imam Khamenei today, alongside Ziyad Nakhaleh of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement, and was assassinated along with his bodyguard and companion, the martyr Wassim Abu Shaaban, in the residence where he was staying by a “treacherous Zionist raid,” as Hamas stated in the movement’s first statement on the assassination. 

The assassination policy of the Zionist regime has attempted to erase the leadership of the Palestinian people for over 76 years now. The names of the martyrs of assassination are great, shining figures of history. Ismail Haniyeh. Saleh al-Arouri. Abu Ali Mustafa. Fathi Shiqaqi. Ghassan Kanafani. Kamal Nasser. Abdel-Aziz Rantisi. Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. Abu Jihad. Mohammed al-Najjar. Basil al-Kubaisi. Tareq Izzedine. Samir Kuntar. Kamal Udwan. Imad Mughniyyeh. Sheikh Khader Adnan. Ibrahim al-Rai: A parade of martyrs on the road to the liberation of Palestine.

Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated as part of a comprehensive policy of the Zionist regime that aims to eliminate the leaders, spokespeople and revolutionary voices of the Palestinian liberation movement. 

This aggression was also an act of war against Iran, and came on the same day as the attempted assassination of a leader of Hezbollah, the Lebanese resistance movement, through the Zionist bombing of the southern suburbs of Beirut,  and on a day that the US bombed Iraq, targeting the Iraqi resistance, assassinating three members of the resistance forces. It is also clear that this is not a Zionist crime alone, but a crime bought and paid for by the United States and its imperialist partners. 

These assassinations have not undermined the strength, solidarity, commitment and firmness of the alliance of resistance forces in the region. From Iran to Lebanon, Yemen to Iraq to Syria, and of course, to Palestine, where the people and the Resistance daily confront the genocidal Zionist regime, the people have the right and the determination to resist, to respond and to confront the assassins and genocidaires. Further, this crime does not demonstrate the “strength” of the Zionist entity but rather its desperation and decline. These assassinations and international aggressions come as the Zionist regime is rent with internal contradictions and riots as settlers and soldiers demand the right to rape imprisoned Palestinians, reflecting the death throes of a wounded colonial monster.

Ismail Haniyeh, 61, a husband, father and grandfather, was born a Palestinian refugee in al-Shati camp and struggled all his life for the liberation of the Palestinian people. From his days as a student, a football player, and a leader in the Islamic Bloc at the Islamic University of Gaza, he was dedicated to the Hamas movement and to Palestine. In 1989, amid the great popular Intifada and shortly after the founding of the movement, Haniyeh was abducted and imprisoned by the Zionist regime for three years, before he was among 415 Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders and members forcibly deported to Marj al-Zuhour in southern Lebanon on 17 December 1992, alongside Dr. Abdelaziz al-Rantisi, Sheikh Youssef Sarkji, Sheikh Saleh al-Arouri, Dr. Mahmoud al-Zahhar, and, among many others, Mustafa Abu Ora, the martyr of the prisoners’ movement just five days ago. 

He headed the office of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in Gaza and was elected the leader of Hamas in Gaza in 2004, following the assassination of Abdel-Aziz al-Rantisi. In 2017 Haniyeh was elected by the Hamas movement to lead its Political Bureau and was reelected to this position in 2021. 

Haniyeh was the chief negotiator mandated by the Hamas movement and all of the organizations of the Palestinian Resistance, and this assassination aims to prevent him from seeing and directly welcoming the prisoners freed by the Resistance and once again underlines that the Zionist regime is only interested in continued genocide. 

Over 60 of his family members have been martyred, killed by the Zionist regime in the past 10 months, including three of his children and five of his grandchildren. “The blood of my children is not more valuable than the blood of the people of Palestine and all the martyrs in Gaza are my children,” he said, cherishing all of the martyrs of Palestine.

“There is no difference between the martyrs, and they have all been chosen by the Most Merciful to pave our way to victory and freedom,” he said. “The blood of the martyrs demands that we do not compromise, do not relent, do not change or alter, do not weaken, and do not despair, but continue our path with determination.”

The martyr Tareq Izzedine, of the Islamic Jihad movement, gave his last statement before his assassination on the martyrdom of Sheikh Khader Adnan, himself assassinated through deliberate refusal of medical care in the Zionist prisons. His words remain resonant today (video by Resistance News Network): “Whenever a leader ascends, ten will emerge to replace them. When a martyr ascends, 100 martyrs will emerge to replace them. The march continues, and it does not stop until the defeat of the occupation.”

Just today, Ismail Haniyeh said, in his meeting with Imam Khamenei, “Yesterday marked the 300th day of the Gaza War, and we have now reached a critical and historic stage in which the Palestinian people and the Resistance Forces must sustain their heroism and victory.”

His last major statement was for the prisoners, and for popular mobilization, urging people everywhere to participate in the August 3 call to action for Gaza and the Prisoners. “Freedom is near for our dignified prisoners and honorable female prisoners, and victory is coming for our people and our valiant resistance.”

“We call for active and massive participation on this national and global day in defense of our prisoners and our people in the Gaza Strip, to expose the brutal crimes of the occupation against them, and to support their rights and just cause….We look forward to making the 3 of August a pivotal day in all parts of Palestine, in the refugee camps and the diaspora, in our Arab and Islamic world, & among all the free people of the world, to support our people in Gaza and our free prisoners in the occupation’s prisons.”

We must all mobilize, on August 3 and beyond. We must all act. We must all continue the struggle, to confront Zionism and imperialism everywhere and to hold them accountable for their crimes.

From Beirut to Tehran to Gaza to Haifa, to all of our communities, this is the time for action and confrontation. They have never killed the resistance and will not succeed in doing so today. 

Ismail Haniyeh and all of the martyrs live on, and their legacy of commitment, sacrifice and love for the people is an inspiration to generations to come. The defeat of Zionism is forthcoming, as is the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea. Every one of the honourable martyrs have sacrificed everything in order to make that vision a material reality that is closer every day.

Glory to the martyr Ismail Haniyeh and all the martyrs of Palestine and the Resistance. Return, liberation and victory to Palestine, all of Palestine, from the river to the sea.

Sde Teiman: the true face of the Zionist project

Since the establishment of “Israel’s” notorious Sde Teiman concentration camp, filled with thousands of Palestinian civilians from Gaza, rounded up and abducted from cities, refugee camps, schools and hospitals by the invading Zionist army as part and parcel of their genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza, those who are released have spoken about the horror of their experiences at the hands of the occupation soldiers. Palestinian survivors have testified about rape and sexual assault, starvation and denial of food, people being handcuffed 24/7, forced amputations of limbs due to torture, denial of medical care, beatings, noise and sound torture, “hooding” and binding of detainees, attacks by trained dogs, and all other forms of abuse and torture.

Palestinian survivor after survivor have spoken on the record about their experiences. At least 38 Palestinian detainees from Gaza held at Sde Teiman have been martyred under torture and denied medical treatment, even though the full scope of the crimes are not yet visible due to the secrecy surrounding the torture camp. Palestinian lawyer Khaled Mahajneh, the first lawyer to speak to detainees held at Sde Teiman recounted multiple instances of rape and sexual assault, electric shock torture, dangerous hygiene conditions (the journalist he visited was “covered in dirt and bird droppings”) and brutal beatings. Even CNN, the Washington Post, the New York Times, imperialist outlets that have eagerly promoted Zionist propaganda about its genocide in Gaza, have covered the horror that is Sde Teiman — and, indeed, the entire Zionist prison system.

Sde Teiman is a systemic crime

Sde Teiman is not an aberration or an unusual case. It is part and parcel of the military system and the use of imprisonment to target Palestinians en masse. It is the labour camps of the 1947-1948 Nakba, the interrogation centres throughout occupied Palestine. Sde Teiman is, of course, also Guantanamo, and Abu Ghraib, as the US and the Zionist regime share strategies of torture, interrogation and abuse directed, largely, at Palestinian and Arab men. In short: Sde Teiman is Zionism and imperialism; it is the fruit of the perpetrators of the genocide; it is the experience of Palestinian prisoners and the entire Palestinian people, for over 76 years, distilled and condensed into a concentration camp to torture the victims of genocide.

Sde Teiman burst once more into global visibility on July 29, after nine Zionist soldiers were arrested by military police for their role in the mass rape and sexual assault of at least one Palestinian detainee, who was injured so badly that he was hospitalized due to the damage to his rectum and anus. The arrest is itself extremely uncommon, given that Zionist soldiers have been essentially given free rein to engage in a widespread, systemic campaign of torture, rape and abuse against the Palestinian people, part of the same genocidal campaign that has taken over 40,000 Palestinian lives in Gaza, from the bombing of water wells and treatment plants to the systematic destruction of hospitals and the health care system to the bombing of refugees in tents and children at play to the numerous TikTok videos made by Zionist soldiers boasting of their war crimes and displaying them to the world.

From the daily settler violence in the West Bank of occupied Palestine to the leading politicians of the regime ordering more genocide on a daily basis, complete impunity is built into the system. However, the growing international pressure, including the legal pressure at the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice — as well as, reportedly, new forthcoming restrictions on British arms trade with the Zionist regime, has mandated that the Zionist regime make at least the appearance of some form of discipline for the most extreme examples of abuse. The crimes at Sde Teiman were not perpetrated by nine occupation soldiers, but by the entire occupation regime.

Zionists demand the right to rape

However, the arrest of the nine soldiers did not stop there. Military police entered the compound and seized the soldiers, taking them away. It must be noted that this “raid” was conducted with far greater care and non-violence than the daily dozens of raids throughout occupied Palestine, where occupation soldiers blow the doors off Palestinian homes, steal children from their beds and terrorize families on a nightly basis. However, it is the response to the arrests that truly has put the reality of Zionism on display, if the past ten months of videos and photos of livestreamed genocide did not consolidate that reality: throngs of paramilitary settlers and fascist politicians rioting to demand the right to rape Palestinian detainees. These fascist mobs were allowed to engage in violent riots and invade military bases, in sharp contrast to the occupation opening fire with live bullets on Palestinian demonstrators.

This is the reality of Zionism: Masses of fascists screaming for their unlimited right to rape and abuse Palestinians, with Members of the Knesset affirming it openly, with Likud MK Hanoch Milvetsky declaring that “everything is legitimate” in response to a direct question about rape with foreign objects and politician after politician declaring it unacceptable that Zionist soldiers could be tried or arrested for their crimes. And, as expected, occupation authorities have reportedly “acknowledged mistakes” — not for allowing the rapes to continue, but for arresting the rapists too visibly! This is the point that the internal crisis and decay of the Zionist regime has reached, in full view of the world.

The rape-supporting riots and the exposure of the crimes at Sde Teiman have also thrown a sharp light on the campaign of lies and misinformation directed against the Palestinian resistance. Released “Israeli” detainees held by the Palestinian resistance and released in prisoner exchanges have, despite massive incentives to do otherwise, largely spoken of their well-treatment by the Resistance. The photos of released Zionist detainees, compared to those of released Palestinian detainees, speak for themselves. Despite conditions of genocide and starvation throughout Gaza, the captives of the resistance received all the food available, while the Zionist forces deliberately starve Palestinian detainees despite an abundance of resources supported and funded by the world’s imperialist powers, including the US, Germany, Britain, France, Canada and Italy.

The smear campaign against the Palestinian resistance

Further, the drumbeat of misinformation and misrepresentation about Al-Aqsa Flood and the 7 October military operation of the Palestinian Resistance is perhaps more exposed than ever. Despite the loud claims and propaganda campaigns of Zionist officials, U.S. officials, and even complicit international institutions, not a shred of evidence for rape and sexual assault as part of the Al-Aqsa Flood has been produced. Indeed, the unproven and fantastical allegations have largely been sourced from right-wing Zionist men, the same ones responsible for false allegations of “beheaded and burned babies.” Now, right-wing Zionist men are rioting against their own state for the right to rape, burn and kill Palestinians. Sde Teiman is not “revenge” for October 7 — the institutional crimes that are crystallized in Sde Teiman are part of the reason why the Palestinian resistance has been willing to undertake such tremendous sacrifices, before, during and after October 7 in order to liberate the Palestinian prisoners — and of course, to liberate Palestine, from the river to the sea.

It cannot be any clearer that the defamation of the Palestinian resistance is perhaps the clearest exmple of “every accusation is a confession” on the part of the Zionist regime. The Palestinian resistance forces have consistently and firmly conducted themselves with honour, faith and commitment to the liberation of their land and people, while the Zionist occupation forces have engaged in a genocidal orgy of destruction. After Sde Teiman, the reality must be clear to all.

Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, the NYPD and Sde Teiman

Of course, the crimes of Sde Teiman are part and parcel of the Zionist alliance with imperialism as well. They are sharply reminiscent of the reliance on sexualized torture and abuse of Arab men at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, just as the torture in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib recalled decades of torture of Palestinian prisoners, so much that one chair used for torture was referred to as the “Palestinian chair” by U.S. interrogators. This practice is not confined to U.S. imperialism in the Arab nation, of course; NYPD cops’ rape of Haitian American Abner Louima with an object in 1997, so severe as to require three surgeries, once again highlighted the systematic violence against Black people carried out by US cops, including sexual violence directed at Black men and women.

Sexualized torture has not been confined to Palestinian and Arab men, of course; Palestinian women have been subjected to extreme sexual assault, torture and abuse. Rasmea Odeh exposed these crimes to the world at the United Nations and the Sunday Times in 1979; of course, she was later deported from the United States for her bravery. Algerian women were subjected to mass rape by French colonizers, including political prisoners jailed for their resistance to colonialism. Palestinians — and Zionists — documented the rape of Palestinian women and girls in the Nakba of 1947-48. The allegorical references to the rape of the land of Palestine by the occupation forces, their settlements and their land confiscation, are built on a material foundation of the physical rape of Palestinian women and men.

The Zionist regime is not only subjecting Palestinian prisoners — in Sde Teiman and in the “regular” Israel Prison Service prisons, directed by Itamar Ben-Gvir, one of the “right to rape” leaders — to severe torture and abuse, it is imprisoning the bodies of the martyrs after they are killed. Approximately 38 Palestinians have been confirmed to have been martyred at Sde Teiman, including famed surgeon Dr. Adnan al-Bursh, and approximately 21 in the Zionist prisons. Several of the martyrs’ and survivors’ stories are told in a new article in the Washington Post.

Organize, resist and act! 

Despite all of these crimes, the Palestinian prisoners’ movement continues to play a leadership role in the liberation struggle, to develop the movement and to organize together, confronting the Zionists with their bodies and lives on the line on a daily basis. The Resistance, led in Gaza, in the West Bank, throughout occupied Palestine, in Lebanon, in Yemen, in Iraq and throughout the region, is fighting to defend humanity and to bring these crimes to an end, once and for all. There can be no accomodation with the Zionist regime, a criminal regime built upon genocide, dispossession and destruction, but only its defeat and dismantlement.

As we join in the global outrage at the crimes of Sde Teiman, we must redouble our efforts to organize to end the genocide, to stand with the resistance, to liberate the prisoners and for a free Palestine, from the river to the sea. We urge all appalled by the “right to rape riots” to join in the global actions on August 3 for Gaza and the prisoners: take direct action, organize mass rallies, educate your communities, and shut down Zionism and imperialism. 

As their peers receive exam results, 55 Palestinian high school students imprisoned in colonial jails

Today, high school students in the West Bank are receiving their results from their final high school exam, the Tawjihi, a national examination taken by all graduating high school students.

Inside the Zionist colonial prisons, 55 Palestinian high school students are currently being imprisoned, deprived of the possibility of obtaining their diploma.

Throughout the West Bank, in tribute to the martyrs and in the face of the ongoing genocide in Gaza, Palestinian families receiving their tawjihi results have chosen not to celebrate today, which is normally an occasion of joy and sharing.

This year, there are no firecrackers or fireworks in the streets. The cities of the West Bank are empty and silent. With dignity, confronting the seriousness of the current situation, high school students across Palestine are dedicating their academic achievements to the martyrs, prisoners and the people of Gaza, with silence and calm accompanying prayers.

The fellow students, families and comrades of the high school students who have been martyred, sometimes fighting to defend their camps, cities and homeland against the invading Zionist army, are honoring their memories today by offering sweets and water to their communities.

The families of the martyrs gather at the graves or in their homes, consoling themselves by gazing upon the photos and portraits of their loved ones that hang on their walls, like the mother of Basil Ayman Al-Ghazawi from Jenin camp, who was deprived of the joy of high school graduation and success, after he was assassinated, along with his brother Mohammed, in Ibn Sina hospital, by the Zionist army.

The children of the prisoners are thinking of their mothers and fathers in prison, eagerly awaiting their child’s results. For example, the prisoner Siham Abu Ayyash, from Beit Ummar, Al Khalil, the mother of twins. Both received their results today and dedicated their achievements to their mother and her fellow prisoners before sharing their immense sadness at the thought of their compatriots in Gaza.

In the Gaza Strip, confronting ongoing US-Zionist genocide since last October, thousands of students and hundreds of teachers have been murdered by the Zionist army. The education system is completely destroyed, and only a few high school students from Gaza have been able to graduate in unimaginable conditions, most of them in exile.

Glory to the martyrs, freedom for the prisoners!
From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free! 

August 2, NYC: Palestine Revolutionary Study Group with Samidoun

Join us this Friday August 2 at Mayday Space, 176 St Nicholas Ave Brooklyn @ 7pm as we continue our series of group study events exploring and discussing an important scientific analysis of the Palestinian Revolution: “Strategy for the Liberation of Palestine”

🗓️ Date: August 2
⏰ Time: 7 pm
📍 Place: Mayday Space, 176 St Nicholas Ave, Brooklyn
📕Chapters: From “Forces of Revolution” to “Organization and Mobilization” p 41-67
✨ RSVP: bit.ly/RSVPLiberationStudy

“Strategy for the Liberation of Palestine” PDF: bit.ly/PFLPLiberation

To learn more about Samidoun NY/NJ, follow the Telegram:
T.me/Samidoun_nynj