Israeli court rejects Palestinian bid for jail release
An Israeli military court has dismissed an appeal by a hunger striking Palestinian journalist to end his administrative detention.
Palestinian Minister for Prisoner Affairs Issa Qaraqe told Ma’an news agency on Saturday that the Ofer prison court ruled to maintain the six-month administrative detention period for Muhammad al-Qiq despite the inmate’s worsening health condition.
Qaraqe said the court’s decision “proves intentions of revenge” by the Tel Aviv regime against the Palestinian prisoner, describing Qiq’s detention as arbitrary while no specific charges have been leveled against him.
The 33-year-old journalist with the Arabic-language Palestine al-Yawm news went on a hunger strike on November 24, 2015, to protest his administrative detention.
Earlier this week, Jawad Boulos, a lawyer of the rights group Palestinian Prisoners’ Society, said the reporter was in critical condition, while handcuffed to a hospital bed.
The Palestinian Authority Committee for Prisoners’ Affairs has warned that the Israeli authorities may be preparing to force-feed Qiq.
More than 7,000 Palestinian prisoners are currently held in some 17 Israeli jails, dozens of whom are serving multiple life sentences.
Over 500 detainees are under administrative detention, which is a sort of imprisonment without trial or charge that allows Israel to incarcerate Palestinians for up to six months. The detention order can be renewed for indefinite periods.
Palestinian detainees have continuously staged open-ended hunger strikes in an attempt to voice their anger at their illegal and unfair detention.
Last year, the Israeli regime passed a controversial bill allowing the force-feeding of hunger-striking prisoners to counter the Palestinian hunger-strikers’ protest.
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