The Holy Land 5 – Ghassan Elashi, Shukri Abu Baker, Mohammed al-Mezain, Mufid Abdulqader, and Abdurrahman Odeh – five Palestinian political prisoners held in US jails for their charity work, have been imprisoned for five years.
Their daughters, with the contributions of supporters around the world produced the following video, calling for their freedom. To learn more about the Holy Land 5 case, please visit Freedom to Give.
All 170 Palestinian administrative detainees in occupation jails went on a one-day hunger strike on Monday, November 25, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Center for Studies reported.
Administrative detainees in Negev, Ofer and Megiddo started their first day in an intermittent hunger strike as part of their ongoing protests against their imprisonment without charge or trial.
The administrative detainees in Negev have been subjected to harsh measures in response to their protest from the prison administration, including the solitary confinement of four prisoners in isolation cells on Sunday November 24.
All electrical appliances were removed from administrative detainees’ cells, they are being prevented from recreation and denied family visits for a month. In addition, the Negev prison administration is threatening to transfer 50 prisoners.
Administrative detainees announced earlier their plans to boycott Israeli military courts in Ofer, Negev, and the Supreme Court in Jerusalem. They have announced that they will escalate in coming months, including a potential open-ended hunger strike and boycott of prison clinics.
Three Palestinian administrative detainees in Ofer prison are engaged in an open hunger strike since November 16, brothers Mohammed and Islam Badr and Thaer Abdu.
All three are held in a single room in section 14 in Ofer prison, and are on a total strike, taking only water, reported Palestinian lawyer and Prisoners Society director Jawad Boulos. Section 14 is a criminal section of Ofer prison rather than a political (labeled as “security”) section. However, Boulos reported that Islam Badr has been taken to interrogation and he was unable to meet with him during his visit.
Mohammed Badr was arrested on October 28 and a six-month administrative detention order issued against him by Ofer military court. He is a former prisoner who served four and one-half years in prison after his arrest in 2008. Islam Badr is currently under a three-month administrative detention order; he was also held for 50 days in 2011. Thaer Abdo was arrested on October 27 and is being held under a 6-month administrative detention order. He is also a former prisoner who served two and one-half years after his 2006 arrest.
The three prisoners entered an open hunger strike to protest the administrative detention during a campaign of mass arrests carried out by the occupation forces through a special undercover force after the Israeli military’s killing of Mohammed Assi, a leader of Al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of Islamic Jihad, last month.
Mohammed and Islam Badr were seized by undercover occupation forces from a shop belonging to their family after their cell phones and laptops were taken.
Palestinian political prisoner Mona Qa’adan has been denied family visits since her arrest on November 13, 2012.
The Palestinian Prisoners Society said the use of security orders to deny family visits to Palestinian prisoners had been increased by about 30% under the pretext of security, but that these orders fundamentally deprive prisoners of family contact, humiliate and punish them.
Mahmoud Qa’adan, Mona’s brother, called for human rights organizations and in particular the International Committee of the Red Cross, to put pressure on the Israeli state to stop this practice of interfering with family visits. Qa’adan noted that some family members are denied permits to enter, while other family members are given permits and then when attempting to visit are informed they are prohibited from visiting despite having been issued permits.
Ragheb Abu Diak, secretary of the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, said that the Israeli occupation is preventing prisoners from family visits, and is violating the Fourth Geneva Convention permitting prisoners to receive visits. He noted that many of those banned are older, including prisoners’ mothers and fathers.
Mona Qa’adan has been arrested several times and spent over 3 and one-half years inside Israeli prisons, then was released in the October 2011 prisoner exchange before her re-arrest last year.
Akram Al-Fassisi, Palestinian administrative detainee on hunger strike, was transferred from Ramle prison clinic to Assaf Harofe hospital on October 24.
Al-Fassisi, 30, is from Ethna village near al-Khalil. He launched an open-ended hunger strike on September 29, in protest of the extension of his administrative detention without charge or trial.
He is married with 2 children and was arrested by occupation forces on November 16, 2012. His adminitrative detention has now been extended twice without any charge or trial. He was previously imprisoned from February 2011 until July 2012, charged with membership in Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine.
Alaa Samir Yousef Hammad, on hunger strike since May 2, 2013 until today, entered his eighth year in occupation prisons on November 24.
Bahaeddin Dagher, the spokesperson for the Center for Palestinian Prisoners Studies in Jordan, said that he has been on hunger strike demanding his just rights for nearly seven months.
He was arrested on November 24, 2006 and sentenced to 12 years in occupation prisons after being convicted by a military court of involvement in resistance.
Dagher called for broad support for Hammad and his strike, noting the deterioration of his health. His support team recently received a message that “doctors are having difficulty in finding a place in the arm to put the needle for glucose” due to the length of his strike.
Belal Omar produced the following video of the family of Alaa Hammad, Palestinian hunger striker in Israeli detention with Jordanian citizenship. Click on “cc” or “Captions” to show English subtitles. Take action below to demand freedom for Alaa Hammad!
The daughters of the Holy Land 5 (Palestinian political prisoners in US jails) are working on a video and asking for submissions from around the world. On Nov 24, it’ll be 5 years since they were falsely convicted.
We NEED your video submission no later than Friday at 12pm PST. If you have any questions, please contact the organizers at freetheholyland5@gmail.com. The Facebook page for this action is: https://www.facebook.com/events/358875110916589/
Video guidelines:
Please use the following lines for your poster – choose one, but feel free to do more than one line!
-5 years ago
-5 men were falsely convicted
-for feeding children & families
-for building hospitals and schools
-for promoting humanity
-The Holy Land Foundation 5
-I miss my friend
-I miss my mentor
-I miss my teacher
-I miss my neighbor
– I miss my uncle
(If you have another one, be creative. If you speak another language, please translate it, for example, French & english, Portuguese & english, etc.)
– HLF5, it’s been 5 Years
-we believe they’re innocent (5 people)
-we will not give up
-help break the silence
-and spread awareness
-free the Holy Land 5
For more updates, please visit the Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/358875110916589/
The Progressive Democratic Student Pole “Al-Qotob” at Birzeit University issued the following statement on November 17, refusing to welcome French President Hollande to Palestine (Translation by Translators for Palestine). They particularly draw attention to the case of imprisoned Arab struggler Georges Ibrahim Abdallah in French prison. For more information on the campaign in solidarity with Abdallah, please see: http://liberonsgeorges-en.overblog.com/
We, the Progessive Democratic Student Pole “Al-Qotob” of Birzeit University, reject French President Francois Hollande’s planned visit to the Palestinian Authority this coming Monday. We call upon the university administration not to participate in welcoming him.
We view Hollande’s visit to Palestine as a media stunt to sanitize and whitewash the image of colonialism in the minds of our people, and to improve his image on the Arab and international levels.
A delegation from the university is planned to participate in welcoming him, in order to explain to Hollande “the demands of the Palestinian youth,” which will allow him to appear to care about the opinions of the participants, and to express “sympathy” for our cause; this will paint him as a “humane leader” in spite of his foreign policies, which illustrate that France remains a colonialist state.
France as a colonial entity has not ended; what happened in Libya, and what happens today in Syria and other African countries in terms of NATO involvement, is nothing but a new form of colonialism. France stands alongside the imperialist Zionist entity, as Hollande will visit the Knesset and the Zionist government tomorrow.
What freedom France might have—if at all—is strictly national and limited to some of its domestic policies; on the foreign and international levels, it remains a form of colonialism that calls for the oppression of peoples, not for their freedom.
Based on the above, we call upon the university administration to heed the student movement, so that we are not forced to escalate our protest. We will not allow for it to go down in history that Birzeit University contributed to the sanitization and legitimization of the image of colonialism, and that it stood alongside those who imprisoned the Arab nationalist fighter George Abdallah.
We are all George Abdallah, we are all Abd al-Qadir al-Jaza’iri.
Palestinian political prisoner Yousry el-Masri, 30, from Gaza, is suffering from cancer of the thyroid after years of deliberate medical negligence, reported Palestinian Prisoners Society lawyer Shereen Nasser after a visit to Ramle prison clinic.
In two years in Nafha prison, el-Masri suffered from pain in his abdomen, severe headache, hot flashes and sweating; blood tests were conducted, yet he received only painkillers for treatment of what was actually thyroid cancer.
El-Masri said that this was part of a policy of medical neglect against prisoners that dismisses prisoners’ pain and suffering and refuses to provide appropriate medical testing, examination or treatment.
El-Masri was finally sent to Soroka hospital after severe deterioration in his health, where a tumor was discovered in his thyroid and enlarged lymph nodes. It took several months to receive approval for surgery to remove his thyroid. He was kept shackled despite his surgery and severe illness during his recovery.
Nasser said that El-Masri reported that the prison administration transferred the doctor and clinic director from Nafha prison, saying that this took place due to their responsibility for his health condition and suffering. El-Masri said that the prison authorities handle prisoners’ health isues with careles indifference. El-Masri is now awaiting proper treatment and chemotherapy.
Myassar Atyani, Palestinian activist imprisoned with comrades on August 15, 2013, was released on November 13.
Myassar Atyani is a former detainee who was seized by occupation police with her friends and comrades, former prisoners Linan Abu Ghoulmeh and Leena Jawabreh, in August. They were accused of entering Palestine ’48 without a permit. Linan was released one month ago and Leena two months ago. Myassar is a prominent women’s and prisoners’ rights activist. Thousands of people around the world joined in the call for their freedom.
