Call for Action as Khader Adnan Enters his 60th Day of Hunger Strike

Today there has been a mass call for action from the Palestinian and International community, which will include a demonstration at Ofer prison, in solidarity with Khader Adnan, as he enters his 60th day of hunger strike.

Adnan, who was detained in an Israeli prison without trial or justification, has become a Palestinian symbol against administrative arrest and the normalisation of heavy punitive measures undertaken by the Israeli Prison Service.

He inspired the action through his words "For every gram you lose from your weight, we gain a thousand grams in our dignity." This has lead to many human rights groups, including Amnesty international, calling for an international response.

Khader Adnan was arrested on 17th December in front of his pregnant wife and two young daughters at 3.30am, suffered horrific abuse at the hands of the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF). It was reported that after his family were verbally abused by the IOF, he was then escorted to an Israeli jeep on the way to the detention centre where he was severely beaten, smeared with dirt from his interrogators, tortured by being placed in painful stressful situations and finally kept in solitary confinement. The day following his arrest, he declared a hunger strike with the terms that either charges were brought against him or he was to be released.

It was reported from Khalid's wife, contrary to belief 'he is not in a coma although his health is rapidly deteriorating and he is extremely weak and dizzy." In light of his rapidly deteriorating health, his wife made a statement that he remains close to death and manacled to the hospital bed.

On Monday, a military court rejected an appeal by his lawyers against the four month administrative detention order, which allows him to be held without charge and which can be renewed indefinitely. Adnan's lawyer, Attorney Jawad Bulus, made a statement on Tuesday, that he would file an urgent request to the Jewish state's highest court of appeals, to overturn the military order imprisoning his client without trial, in light of a rapid decline in the health of Khader Adnan.

Hunger strikes in prisons are in no way unique, as this followed the strike of almost 2000 Palestinian political prisoners who declared a hunger strike, in October 2011, against the punitive measures undertaken by Israeli Prison Service (IPS). It was reported by Addameer Prison Association that they were " held in administrative detention without charge or trial; and imprisoned in harsh and illegal detention conditions". They were furthermore refused the right of access to university education, newspapers and books. The IPS had also started "shackling all prisoners' hands and legs to and from all visits, and in some prisons, the duration of family visits has been shortened from 45 to 30 minutes, with children under the age of 8 unable to have physical contact with incarcerated parents as they were before." Although this came to a conclusion when Israeli prisoner Gilad Shalit was released in exchange for the release of 1,027 Palestinian prisoners, the punitive measures and arbitrary arrests of Palestinian citizens has continued.

Amnesty International has recently organised a campaign against the illegal arbitrary arrests and detention of political prisoners and has called for the international community to take action. Furthermore, Palestinian prisoner affairs minister Issa Qaraqa, has called for demonstrations, protest marches and solidarity fasts throughout the Palestinian territories on Wednesday.

 http://english.pnn.ps/index.php/prisoners/867-call-for-action-as-khader-adnan-enters-his-60th-day-of-hunger-strike