Palestinian Prisoners in Israel Call Off Hunger Strike After Reaching Understandings With Prison Service

Prisoners were planning to strike in demand to improve medical care and stop nightly searches in prison cells. “All our demands were met,” a senior Palestinian official tells The Media Line.

One thousand Palestinian security prisoners jailed in Israel called off on Thursday a planned hunger strike that was intended to protest what they described as “worsening conditions” in prison. The prisoners belong to all Palestinian factions, including Fatah, Hamas, and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and were found guilty by Israeli courts of carrying out terrorist attacks or attacks on soldiers. According to prisoner advocacy groups, the strike was canceled after the prisoners’ demands were met.

All our demands were answered, from visits to Gaza prisoners to stopping night raids in the prisons

“All our demands were answered, from visits to Gaza prisoners to stopping night raids in the prisons,” Qadri Abu-Baker, head of the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission of the Palestine Liberation Organization, told The Media Line. “We are very happy we didn’t need to take this step, and we hope things will stay as they are, and Israel won’t worsen conditions again,” he added.

In an interview on Thursday morning, he said the demands were “to stop the nightly raids to prison cells, improve medical treatment, and allow sick prisoners to be given leave for surgeries.”

Unannounced searches in prison were initiated by the Israel Prison Service (IPS) after six Palestinian prisoners escaped Gilboa Prison one year ago. The IPS announced it would take several other means to tighten security following the escape but never carried these steps out after prisoners protested them.

Other than that, said Abu-Baker, administrative detainees are also an issue. “There used to be 500 people [in administrative detention]; now there are 700 of them. Some people are going in and out of administrative detention for eight years, with no real legal procedure being done,” he explains.

Administrative detainees can spend years in jail without knowing what the allegations against them are, and fewer than 8% of them stand trial, according to a report by the Knesset Research and Information Center.

More than 4,500 Palestinian security detainees and prisoners are currently being held in IPS facilities; 743 of them are administrative detainees who do not face trial, according to data provided by the IPS and published Thursday in the Israeli daily Haaretz.

Prisoners from the Gaza Strip became ineligible to receive family visits when the COVID-19 pandemic began spreading in 2020; the restriction remains in place for prisoners affiliated with Hamas. It is unclear whether the IPS agreed to change this policy or meet other specific demands.

It’ll go until all demands are met. The prisoners are stubborn, and they prefer to suffer and even die rather than keep living in these conditions.

When asked earlier how far the strike would go, Abu-Baker replied: “It’ll go until all demands are met. The prisoners are stubborn, and they prefer to suffer and even die rather than keep living in these conditions.”

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas released a statement on Wednesday saying the prisoners were a symbol of the Palestinian people. The statement also said, “The presidency holds the Israeli government fully responsible for the lives of all prisoners,” adding that “the Palestinian leadership and people stand by the prisoners in their battle to defend their dignity at a time when Israel continues its disregard for international law by its intransigent position of choosing to crack down on the prisoners.”

This sort of hunger strike can happen because Palestinian prisoners run an autonomy in the prisons and keep a balance of terror with the prison service. This means they have a considerable amount of power in the prison’s management.

The effectiveness of a threatened hunger strike doesn’t surprise some people. “The interests of the Israel Prison Service aren’t always the same as those of the rest of the security system. The prison service mainly wants quiet and avoids political issues and confrontations. This sort of hunger strike can happen because Palestinian prisoners run an autonomy in the prisons and keep a balance of terror with the prison service. This means they have a considerable amount of power in the prison’s management,” Gonen Ben-Itzhak, a former Shin Bet handler, tells The Media Line. “Many of the military commanders in terrorist organizations are in jails, and they run the military branches, carrying out terrorist attacks from within prison,” he explains.

This is one of the conflicts between the prison service and other branches of the Israeli security system: While Israel’s security agencies would prefer to disable cellphones in the prisons to intercept terrorist attacks, the IPS fears the unrest it might cause among prisoners and refuses to do so. Former Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan allowed phone use in prisons following a hunger strike in 2019.

But prison conditions may not be the only reason for strike threats. In recent weeks, Israel intensified its counterterror activity in the West Bank and nightly raids became routine in Nablus and Jenin, often causing casualties on the Palestinian side.

These things affect each other. When Palestinians die in the streets, it affects the prisoners. When the medical status of a prisoner is bad, it causes unrest in the streets of Palestinian cities.

“These things affect each other. When Palestinians die in the streets, it affects the prisoners. When the medical status of a prisoner is bad, it causes unrest in the streets of Palestinian cities,” says Ben-Itzhak, who previously investigated Palestinian suspects and gathered human intelligence in the West Bank. “Israelis don’t realize how acute the prisoners are for Palestinian society,” he adds. Abbas has said several times in the past that if the PA would have only one cent left in its coffers, it would go to the families of prisoners.

“Based on my experience, there’s an ongoing dialogue between the prisoners and the outside world. There are many different interests, and it’s naïve to assume it’s only about jail conditions,” says Ben-Itzhak. “You don’t need to be a genius to realize that a government before elections wants quiet and therefore is more sensitive to this sort of pressure,” he adds.

The IPS said no strike would take place and declined to answer further inquiries made by The Media Line on the topic.