Article – Julie Webb-Pullman
It was reported late on Friday night that Israel had made an offer to the hunger-striking Palestinian prisoners. The offer, however, made no mention of ending administrative detention or the ‘Shalit Law,’ both of which are key demands of the hunger-strikers. Nor did it contain any reference to timelines for implementation and completion of other conditions of the offer.
I went to Al Jundy on Saturday afternoon and talked with one of the prisoners released last year in the ‘Gilad Shalit’ exchange – Tawfiq Abu Naim, who is also hunger-striking in sympathy with those still imprisoned, over 2,000 of whom are now hunger-striking.
I asked Tawfiq how the Israeli offer had been received, and whether it met their demands. Here is his response.
It is clear, then, that Israel is not acting in good faith with this latest offer, which is little more than a recycled tissue of teasers designed to divert attention away from the substantive issues.
While some Fateh prisoners are reported to have accepted 50% of the Israeli offer, the majority of prisoners, and their supporters outside, refuse to be sidetracked. Abu Naim affirmed that the committee made up of different Palestinian factions that represents the hunger strikers has the sole right to make decisions regarding it.
At least fifty people in Gaza have now joined the hunger strike in the solidarity tents in Al Jundy, including several women. They are adamant they will not give up until the prisoners’ demands are met.
Despite the fact that ten hunger-strikers have now been hospitalised, and two have just passed their 68th day without food, speakers at every press conference throughout the day emphasised the justness of the prisoners’ demands, and their determination to wage the “Battle of the Empty Stomachs” until they succeed in achieving the rights guaranteed in international law.
As many speakers have stressed, they will hold Israel responsible for any deaths, saying it is not only Israel that loses credibility through its refusal to adhere to international law, but also the organs that are supposed to safeguard it, such as the United Nations, and the international community itself.
Notably hypocritical is the international media and governmental attention being devoted to one Chinese dissident under house arrest, while several thousand Palestinians are being held by Israel in conditions that fail to meet the most minimum standards under the rules for treatment of prisoners, yet the plight of the Palestinian prisoners is ignored.
The price of such such hypocrisy may well be a third intifada.
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