PNGO pledges support to the Palestinian prisoners especially the ones set to go on a hunger strike on April 17, 2017: Hundreds of Palestinian Political prisoners started a hunger strike to achieve specific demands and challenge Israeli unlawful laws as well as protest against medical negligence and arbitrary and extreme measures used against Palestinian prisoners.
Hunger striking prisoners are making a series of demands including having full access to medical care, as it is currently limited to pain killers; acquiring basic rights such as the rights to life and physical integrity as well as the right to receiving legal counseling. They also demand preserving their rights guaranteed under International Human Rights Law, which prohibits torture and cruel inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners. In addition, prisoners demand having access to courts, end solitary confinement and ending the policy of administrative confinement.
Demands also include installation of public phones and allowing access to books, magazines, newspapers and TV channels. In addition, the prisoners request to increase the number of family visits as well as visits duration from 45 to 90 minutes;
Israel holds over 6,700 Palestinian Political prisoners in Israeli prisoners including 300 children, approximately 62 females and over 500 prisoners under Administrative detention. Moreover, 870 prisoners suffer from chronic diseases and are in need of permanent treatment, 27 cases of cancer and 19 prisoners residing in Ramle prison hospital are under inhumane conditions.
We call upon the International Community to hold Israel accountable and compel them to respect International Law and Humanitarian Law, in particular the Fourth Geneva Convention and the UN Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.
Palestinian Non-Government Organizations Network calls for:
1- Immediate release sick detainees, especially those with disabilities and incurable diseases.
2- Urgent formation of international independent investigation unit to assess the Palestinian prisoner’s conditions
3- Release all those who were rearrested after releasing them as part of the so called Shalit bargain.
4- Holding Israel accountable for the death of 209 Palestinian prisoners inside Israeli prisons, 58 of which were victims of medical negligence.
5- Raising the issue of the Palestinian prisoners at the International Criminal Court, the UN Human Rights Council, and the United Nations, in order to prosecute the occupation, and to hold them accountable for their daily violations of the rights of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.