issue no 96

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Issue No : 96 16th June , 2014

Palestinian Cultural Organization Malaysia | 1


PalestinianPalestinianP CulturalCulturalC Organization MalaysiaMalaysiaM

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Palestinian Cultural Organization Malaysia

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FEATURED STORY

ARTICLESIsrael discovers a tunnel dug by

Palestinian prisoners in Shatta prison

Administrative detainees fighting their hunger battle for

55th day running

Human Rights Centre: Israel brutally humiliating hospitalised prisoners on

hunger strike

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Palestinian prisoners refuse settlement as hunger strike sets

record

3 Israeli soldiers went missing near HebronIOF raids different areas of Al-Khalil in search of missing soldiers

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CONTENTS

News of Palestine

ARTICLES

Palestinian prisoners refuse settlement as hunger strike sets record 12

Administrative detainees fighting their hunger battle for 55th day running 4

3 Israeli soldiers went missing near Hebron 5

Human Rights Centre: Israel brutally humiliating hospitalised prisoners on hunger strike 6

Israel discovers a tunnel dug by Palestinian prisoners in Shatta prison 7

PA security forces arrest supporters of hunger strikers in West Bank 8

Report: Friday in Occupied Jerusalem 9

Leaked recording reveals Palestinian chief negotiator slamming Abbas 10

New Israeli plan to build 182 housing units in Pisgat Ze›ev settlement 11

Israel Insider

Malaysia & Palestinian Cause

UPM students express solidarity with hunger strikers 11

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News of Palestine

Administrative detainees fighting their hunger battle for 55th day running

17/6/2014

Palestinian administrative detainees have entered the 55th day of their open-ended hunger strike to pressure their jailers to end their illegal detention without indictment or trial.Consequently, many hunger strikers have been exposed to punitive measures and confined to isolation areas by their jailers in an attempt to force them to break their strike.In a related incident, the reported missing of three Israeli soldiers on Friday in the West Bank made the day of the prisoners and their fami-lies, who hope that they are held by the Palestinian resistance for future swap deals with Israel.An Israeli satellite channel said that some prisoners held small parties in jails and rejoiced over the disappearance of the settlers.

Source: PIC

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3 Israeli soldiers went missing near HebronIOF raids different areas of Al-Khalil in search of missing soldiers

15/6/2014

The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) at dawn Sunday stormed different areas of Al-Khalil province, as part of a widespread security campaign that started three days ago to scour the West Bank for three Israeli soldiers believed to be captured by Palestinian resistance.A large number of Israeli soldiers raided homes in other areas of Al-Khalil, including Khalat Hadour, Hawouz, Assalam street, Ras Al-Jura, Halhoul, Akabat Tafouh and Aroub refugee camp, according to local sources.The Israeli raids in Al-Khalil took place amid intensive military overflights.The IOF soldiers also intensified their security measures in Al-Khalil, deployed more roadblocks throughout the city and its surrounding areas, and turned the city into a closed military zone.The Israeli army arrested 80 Hamas leaders in the security campaign, the IsraeliChannel 7 reported.According to the Israeli army’s radio channel, the army rounded up senior leaders of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad early today.Hamas sources told Anadolu news agency that the arrests targeted at least 75 leaders, including Has-san Youssef, as well as ex-ministers, MPs, and freed prisoners.Violent clashes between young men and Israeli soldiers took place yesterday in Kanar and Senjer areas between Al-Khalil city and Dura town.The Israeli occupation army also declared that all residents of Al-Khalil province would be banned from travelling outside their residential areas until the completion of all search operations.

Source: Agencies

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Human Rights Centre: Israel brutally humiliating hospitalised prisoners on hunger strike

15/6/2014

The Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, Adalah and Physicians for Human Rights have sent an urgent message to the Israeli Ministry of Health and hos-pital managers demanding they immediately stop hand-cuffing prisoners on hunger strike who are transferred to their hospitals.The centre said, in a state-ment on Thursday, that hos-pitalised prisoners are shack-led to bed by their hands and feet 24 hours a day. The prisoners are prevented from movement at all times which further complicates their al-ready deteriorating health.More than eighty Palestin-ian administrative prisoners who have been on hunger strike for over 50 days were transferred to Israeli hospi-tals.Adalah and Physicians for Human Rights demanded that all dangerous restric-tions imposed on prisoners including their most basic humanitarian needs such as using a toilet, especially at night, be stopped. Hospital and prison staff claim they do not have enough wardens to accompany prisoners to the toilet in at night.The hunger strikers are only consuming water increasing their need to use the toilet more urgently. After visit-ing the prisoners on hunger strike, Adalah said that a majority of prisoners pre-

ferred to stay in jail instead of going to the hospital.Adalah attorney Sawsan Zaher said in a statement that “prisoners on hunger strike are handcuffed and their movement is restricted, especially their access to toilets which represent a humiliating torture that would deteriorate their health”. The statement added that “the prisoners’ physical condition does not allow them to move naturally, therefore, the restraint is used, in fact, as a means of revenge against them as part of the Israeli attempt to break their strike.”The statement emphasised that “medical treatment” in such circum-stances contrasts radically with the medical ethical obligations of hospitals and doctors and most importantly with their commitment to the dignity and rights of the patient, according to the laws and rights of the patient and according to the rules of medical ethics developed by the World Medical Association.“All these commitments prevent workers in medical institutions from committing any punitive, brutal or humiliating practices against pa-tients, which are in fact committed by Israel against the prisoners. These practices fall unequivocally within the frame of “illegal tor-ture” and in total contradiction with the terms of the World Conven-tion against torture” the statement said.

Source: ALRAY

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Israel discovers a tunnel dug by Palestinian prisoners in Shatta prison

13/6/2014

Israel’s Walla news website reported that Israel Prison Service, IPS, had discovered on Thursday a tunnel dug by Palestinian prisoners detained in Shatta Prison.The website said that the prison authorities had announced a state of emergency and summoned a large force from the Nachshon Unit to evacuate all prisoners to other prisons.The site revealed that Palestinian prisoners in Shatta maximum security prison were preparing to try to escape by digging a tunnel underneath the sections within a diameter of up to half a meter deep and four meters long.The Israeli Intelligence Service arrived at the prison and began an intensive inspection operation where they found clothes and a stick belonging to the IPS hidden in one of the sections which looked like it would assist in the escape and harm the prison guards.The site pointed out that the prison authorities and the Shin Bet security service began to investigate every possible scenario of the tunnel’s use including the possibility of digging it for other purposes such as to conceal items prohibited by the prison service.IPS in Shatta Prison moved all the prisoners in the afternoon hastily to Megiddo and Gilboa prisons without reasons, in the presence of large numbers of police and army prison.The Shatta prison holds 120 prisoners

Source: AlRAY

Palestinian Cultural

Organization Malaysia

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12/6/2014

The Palestinian Authority security services in the occupied West Bank arrested 28 ac-tivists and journalists in 48 hours and summoned seven others, including senior Hamas officials. All the activists, journalists and Hamas officials were arrested for reasons related to ac-tivities carried out in solidarity with the Palestinian prisoners who have been on hunger strike for 50 days. Female activists and Hamas members were also attacked. In Ramallah, the security services arrested a number of university students during their participation in solidarity activities with hunger strikers. In response, the Islamic Bloc, Hamas’ student arm, started an open-ended sit-in in Berziet University’s campus.They also arrested Islam Faqha, nephew of Palestinian parliamentarian Abduljaber Faqha who was arrested by the Israeli occupation. In the same city, they arrested cameraman Mo’az Amarneh after he refused to hand over the material he’d recorded.The sons of Parliamentarian Hasan Yousef and Hamas leader Jamal Al-Taweel, who is on hunger strike in Israeli jails, were also arrested.In Nablus, the security services arrested Hamas senior leader Sheikh Nazih Abu Oun after they beat and dragged him on the ground. Medical reports showed that Abu Oun suffered severally after being slapped in the face.

Source: MEMO

PA security forces arrest supporters of hunger strikers in West Bank

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Report: Friday in Occupied Jerusalem

14/6/2014

The Israeli occupation has again stepped up its closure policies in East Jerusalem and around al-Aqsa mosque over recent weeks amidst ongoing colonisation proj-ects and renewed calls from extremist Zi-onist groups to demolish the mosque in order to build the ‘Third Jewish Temple’.Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza cannot reach Jerusalem without special travel permits that are issued by the Oc-cupation. These restrictions usually apply to Palestinian men under 50 and women under 45. Such permits require specific reasons such as urgent hospital appoint-ments to have any chance of success and are often still refused even in emergen-cies.Recently, reports have stated that new rules have been imposed allowing only Palestinians with either Jerusalem ID or Israeli citizenship to enter the mosque although these restrictions are not yet be-ing implemented every day.On some recent days, nobody under the age of 45 has been allowed to enter al-Aqsa irrespective of ID status. This has been applied to Palestinians as well as Muslims with foreign passports. Pales-tinians have on regularly been forced to leave their ID cards at the entrance to the mosque before entering.Checkpoints have been installed around

the Old City to impose these policies. In some cases, peo-ple have been prevented from even entering the Old City area on Fridays without meeting various age limit and ID status restrictions (which already prevented most Pales-tinians from the West Bank and virtually all from Gaza from reaching Jerusalem). Such policies not only prevent religious freedoms but also strangle the Old City itself including its economy, identity and culture.Palestinians continue to carry our regular protests against the occupation’s policies in East Jerusalem. The recent ‘Global March to Jerusalem’ was one such event which was tolerated by the Occupation. Conversely, a planned protest in solidarity with Palestinian hunger-striking pris-oners was prevented when a wide blockade of the Old City and its surrounding area was enforced on May 30th with flying checkpoints preventing people even reaching the Old City walls. Following Friday prayers on Friday June 13th the Occupation forces were much less evident than on previous weeks before the prayers, yet as a dem-onstration broke out in solidarity with the hunger-strikers after the prayers occupation forces invaded the mosque compound shooting rubber-coated steel bullets and stun grenades towards worshippers as they attempted to leave. 28 people were injured during these attacks and 8 people were detained.East Jerusalem is recognised by the international commu-nity as the capital of the future Palestinian state. Israel denies this fact and refers to Jerusalem as the ‘undivided and eternal capital of Israel’ as it continues to colonise as much of the city as possible whilst implementing policies which aim to deny Palestinian access to, as existence in, Jerusalem.

Source: MEMO

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Leaked recording reveals Palestinian chief negotiator slamming

Abbas12/6/2014

Abbas is 79 years old, for how long will he live? He should take a stance and protect the Palestinian national project,” the Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat can be heard say-ing in a leaked audio recording published by Awraq network news site yesterday.In the audio recording Erekat is heard laying harsh criticisms against the Palestinian Presi-dent Mahmoud Abbas and the steps he has taken in pursuit of peace. He added: “This [Pales-tine] is not his own property. This is a homeland, this is Pal-estine and this is bigger people. He [Abbas] does not listen to me. I submitted my resignation twice. Does Abbas want to be-come like Bashar Al-Assad and Saddam Hussein. This way of work is impractical. Abu Mazen [Abbas] has cards in his hands that he can use; all he has to do is sign the applications to join UN organisations.”Erekat described angrily how Abbas refused to join the Rome Treaty, the International Criminal Court and the High Court of Justice, saying that it was through these agreements that the Palestinian Authority, which became a state recog-nised by the United Nations, could prosecute Israeli leaders as war criminals.“If this happened,” he ex-plained, “Netanyahu would not be able to travel anywhere in the world.”When he requested a vote on

his and Abu Mazen’s positions on this matter, during the Palestine Liberation Organisation Executive Committee meeting, the result was 13 votes in his favour and four votes in Abbas’ favour, however, Abbas insisted on putting a stop to it.Erekat said he told Abu Mazen “Netanyahu did not leave to you any authority and that you [Abbas] need permission from an Israeli army officer to travel to Jordan and have to determine the number of cars accompanying you.”He continued saying that the Israelis intentionally humiliate Abbas.The negotiator demanded Abbas dismantle the Palestinian Authority saying “the PA was created only to transfer the Palestinian people from occupation to independence and today Netanyahu did not leave us anything to rule, then let him assume his responsibilities as an occupying power. Palestine is not for the Palestinians only; it is for every Arab and Muslim.”Erekat criticised the PA’s security coordination with Israel and point-ed out that there is a new generation of security coordination which has no benefits, saying: “They are bringing up a new generation of security coordination. They are warning us of everything, but for what?! I cooperated and coordinated with Israel and recognised Is-rael but Netanyahu is a useless man! Netanyahu is not interested in peace with us.”He concluded by saying: “I mean how can I ask [US President] Obama or [France’s Foreign Minister] Fabius, I should better ask my president [Abbas].”The audio clearly reveals the intensity of anger felt by the Palestinian leadership regarding Abbas’ unwillingness to take practical steps to join the International Criminal Court and try Israeli leaders as war criminals.Erekat and the Palestinian presidency were not immediately avail-able for comment.

Source: MEMO

Abbas

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New Israeli plan to build 182 housing units in Pisgat Ze›ev settlement

UPM students express solidarity with hunger strikers

14/6/2014

The Israel land authority has announced re-cently tenders for the building of 182 housing units in Pisgat Ze’ev settlement, east Jerusa-lem, the Hebrew newspaper Kol Ha’ir saidThe newspaper added on Friday that three companies won the construction bids to ex-pand Pisgat Ze’ev. According to the newspaper, there is also an Israeli plan to build 12,000 housing units in Modi’in-Maccabim-Re’ut settlement bloc

13/6/2014

For the fifth week in a row, the Palestinian Students Association (PSA) at University Pu-tra Malaysia (UPM) organized a stand in soli-darity with the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails who are on an open-ended hunger strike since 51 consecutive days.The participants expressed their anger over the international silence towards the Palestin-ian prisoners’ cause and urged for more sup-port to the hunger strikers at all levels.The famous (#salt_and_water) slogan was one of the slogans raised and chanted by the participants in English and Malay languages.The activity included several inspiring speech-es by Palestinian student Yusuf Al-Jamal, Ma-laysian student Muhamad Farhannaim and the member of Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) Dr. Nassir Abdul-Jawad who elaborat-ed on the suffering of the Palestinian prisoners hunger strikers in Israeli jails, describing what they are facing currently as a “slow death”.

over four years,1,725 of them will be built during this year.

Source: MEMO

Students of UPM interacted with the event and vowed to pursue their supportive activities till the demands of hunger strikers are met.Administrative prisoners, among many other Pales-tinian detainees, have been on an open-ended hunger strike since April 24th, in what came to be known as the Battle of the Empty Stomachs, to protest Israeli arbitrary detention policy carried out against Palestin-ians with neither charge nor trial.

Source: PCOM

Malaysia & Palestinian Cause

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Palestinian prisoners refuse settlement as hunger strike sets record

Palestinian prisoners participating in the lon-gest mass hunger strike in Palestinian history have rejected a settlement proposed by the Is-raeli prison and intelligence services, incarcer-ated members of a Palestinian party tell MEE.An estimated 300 prisoners are participating in the strike which started on 24 April to pro-test against administrative detentions by Israeli forces. On Tuesday, the strikers entered their 48th day, passing a record set in a 1976 strike, according to human rights associations.Thirteen strikers have suffered internal bleed-ing and two had undergone surgery, according to the Palestinian Prisoner’s Club.The strike gained renewed attention last week when the world’s largest international security corporation, G4S, announced that it would end its contracts with Israeli prisons within three years. The next day, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which had been targeted by pro-testers worldwide during this year’s Palestin-ian Prisoner’s Day for its shares of G4S, told Bloomberg it had liquidated its holdings in the company.‘Not a Serious Offer’ In their rejected offer, Israeli intelligence and prison services had proposed to reduce the pe-riod for which they could hold administrative detainees without charge or trial to a single six-month term, according to the prison branch of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Pales-tine.Israeli prison authorities also reportedly warned strike leaders that they do not “care much about the death of any striking prisoner,” according to a Palestinian Prisoner’s Club statement.Israel’s administrative detention law allows its military commanders to order the imprison-ment of Palestinian residents of the West Bank for six-month terms which can be renewed in-definitely, without specifying charges or giving detainees trials.

The Israeli prison service currently holds 191 Pal-estinians under the law, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club.In their statement, the prisoners said the same terms had been offered and refused during the Karameh (“Dignity”) hunger strike two years ago.“One officer, called Beaton, is the intelligence of-ficer mediating between the intelligence service and the Palestinian detainees,” said Allam al-Kaabi, a PFLP central committee member responsible for prisoners’ affairs.Al-Kaabi knows the prison system well. As a condi-tion of his release in its 2011 prisoner exchange with Hamas, al-Kaabi, once a resident of the Balata refu-gee camp by Nablus in the West Bank, was forced to relocate to the Gaza Strip by Israel. When he left the prison for Gaza, he had completed eight years of nine life sentences ordered by an Israeli military court after his capture in 2003.“[Beaton] came, sat with the hunger strikers’ leader-ship, and offered them things unrelated to the main issue of administrative detention,” al-Kaabi said. “He was trying to bypass it, saying the prison ser-vice could improve conditions. In addition, he said they would research the issue of administrative de-tention.”“Beaton told the prisoners that administrative deten-tion is a political issue. He was not entitled to solve it. This had to be done at the higher levels of the Israeli government.”“Of course they refused that,” al-Kaabi said. He add-

Articles

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ed that the encounter was “the first official meeting” between Israeli officials and the strike leadership, which he called “a positive step.”The offer followed a simi-lar one made to hunger strik-ers in Negev prison ten days ago, said Osama al-Wuhaidi, a spokesman for the Hussam Association, a prisoners’ soci-ety and family support group in Gaza.“They offered to end their detentions individually, im-prisoning them only for their current six-month terms,” he said. “After that, it would not be extended and the detainees would be released.”The roughly 50 prisoners on hunger strike in the prison re-fused the offer, holding that all administrative detentions should be ended. They also said the offer should have gone through the strike leader-ship.“It was not a serious offer,” Wuhaidi said. “They were try-ing to manipulate the prisoners to end the hunger strike, then renege on their agreement.”Last week, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and a special UN hu-man rights committee released statements of concern over the hunger strike, with Ban calling for Israel to charge administra-tive detainees with recognized crimes or “release them with-out delay.”Force-feeding as TortureThe statements came after threats by the Israeli govern-ment to force-feed hunger strikers.A government proposal in the Israeli Knesset to authorize

the practice met condemnation from the Israeli Medical Asso-ciation, whose spokeswoman, Ziva Miral, told the Associated Press, “It goes against the DNA of the doctors to force treatment on a patient.”“Force-feeding is torture, and we can’t have doctors participat-ing in torture,” she added.A 28 May “consensus confer-ence” by the IMA concluded, “In accordance with generally accepted ethical principles in Is-rael and abroad, forced medical treatment, including force-feed-ing is forbidden.”Despite opposition from Israel’s physicians, its parliament is likely to pass the force-feeding bill, Ola Shtiwi, advocacy and intervention coordinator in the prisoners and detainees project of Physicians for Human Rights – Israel (PHR-I), told the Middle East Eye.“The medical community is against it,” she said. “But maybe they will find someone to do it.”The IMA is large and influen-tial, Shtiwi said, but many phy-sicians employed by the Israeli prison service do not belong to it, and are thus immune to sanc-tions, such as expulsion, that it could apply.“It cannot punish them,” she said. “The ministry of health can, but it is behind this bill.”PHR-I has often visited past hun-ger strikers to offer independent medical care. Their access to the current ones has been barred by the Israeli prison service and ministry of health, Shtiwi added.“We’re trying to get final an-swers,” she said. “If we don’t get approval within a few days, we will approach the courts.”Shtiwi estimated that 75 hunger

strikers were currently hospital-ized, but warned, “The number changes all the time. They take people from the prisons to the hospitals, and back again.”If the Knesset, which accepted the bill on its first reading on Monday, ultimately passes it, the detainees have decided not to resist force-feeding, al-Kaabi, the PFLP official responsible for prisoners’ affairs, said.On Monday, strikers in Israel’s Kaplan prison told Addameer at-torneys that doctors had already threatened to force-feed them if they lost consciousness.‘You Are Our only hope’ Late last week, the International Middle East Media Center pub-lished an appeal from admin-istrative detainees and strike representatives Mousa Zawahra and Mousa Yacoub Ma’marjy.“Our great Palestinian nation, defenders of justice all over the world, organizations struggling for Palestinian rights, all gov-ernments and free media outlets: you are our only hope,” the state-ment, written on 26 May, said.On Monday, strike leaders re-leased another statement em-phasizing their determination to continue.“The nurses, who are supposed to be angels of mercy, come into our rooms with food to break our spirits, but we will not give up until we accomplish our goal, and we are willing to die for it,” they wrote to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club. “Each one of us has already written his will, and we have sworn that there is no way back.”Mother and wives of the strik-ers urged the US Congress last week, in a letter released by Ad-dameer, to force Israel to respect

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“Your vital role is crucially need-ed, in ending the policy of admin-istrative deten-tion forever, as this abusive and unlawful practice severely affects the administra-tive detainees and their fami-lies, especially their children,” they wrote.‘A Secret File

international humanitarian and human rights law.“Your vital role is crucially needed, in ending the policy of administrative detention forev-er, as this abusive and unlaw-ful practice severely affects the administrative detainees and their families, especially their children,” they wrote.‘A Secret File’Israeli government officials told Middle East Eye that ad-ministrative detention orders against detainees who pose a danger to public security in the West Bank are “recognized by international law and [are] in full conformity with Article 78 of the Fourth Geneva Conven-tion 194.”“Moreover, local legislation governing the process grants all relevant individuals the right to appeal the order to a Justice of the Military Court of Appeals, for judicial review,” they said.Administrative detainees and their attorneys hold that the process is not transparent. In-stead, they say each adminis-trative detention order is based on what Addameer calls “a se-cret file”, denied to defendants and their counsel.As the strike nears its 50th day, its supporters have welcomed new victories for a campaign launched two years ago to back Palestinian prisoners.On 17 April 2012 – Palestin-ian Prisoners’ Day, as well as the start of the month-long Karameh strike – Addameer, the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, and a coalition of Palestinian organizations called “for action to be taken to hold to account G4S, the world’s largest inter-

national security corporation, which helps to maintain and profit from Israel’s prison sys-tem, for its complicity with Is-raeli violations of international law.”On Thursday, a day after what the Guardian called “violent” removal of protesters from the G4S’ annual meeting in Lon-don by its guards, chief execu-tive officer Ashley Almanza announced that the company would end its contracts with Is-raeli prisons within three years.“We expect them to expire and we don’t expect to renew them,” he told the Financial Times.Following the company’s Thursday announcement and the disclosure by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation of its liquidation of G4S shares, the Palestine Solidarity Cam-paign said in a statement, “G4S has suffered intense reputation-al damage, and it will continue to be targeted until it ends its complicity with Israeli crimes.”Demonstrations in support of the strikers continue to esca-late in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. On Sunday, a commercial strike closed much of down-town Ramallah, while daily protests, including a permanent encampment outside the Inter-national Committee of the Red Cross, persist in Gaza.“They are in the prisons with-out any reason,” said Jamal el-Khoudary, a Palestinian Leg-islative Council member and chairman of the Popular Com-mittee against the Siege, which held a candlelight vigil in Gaza for the prisoners. “Only Israel decides, against all interna-tional law. We urge the world to pressure Israel to set the prison-ers free.”

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issue no 96

Documents

hunger battle

israeli raids

palestinian resistance

hospitalised prisoners

iof soldiers

palestinian chief negotiator

search of missing soldiers

new israeli plan