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<font size=4 color="#FF0000"><b>Several articles follow<br><br>
</font><font size=4>Qaraqe: Israeli prisons suppressing hunger
strike<br><br>
</b></font><font size=3>Published Saturday 10/04/2010 (updated)
11/04/2010 13:30<br>
<a href="http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=275386" eudora="autourl">
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=275386<br><br>
<br>
</a>Bethlehem Ma'an Minister of Prisoners' Affairs Issa Qaraqe said
the Israeli Prison Service has applied punitive measures to 36
Palestinian female prisoners in the Ad-Damun prison in response to a
general hunger strike. <br><br>
Qaraqe said the IPS has reduced the detainees' recess to one her per day,
prohibited them from sending letters to their family, and further
enforced restricted access to the cantina, where prisoners can buy
stationary and other goods, because they have participated in a hunger
strike which began on 7 April. <br><br>
Moreover, the minister said the prison administration has transferred a
number of prisoners from the Nafha prison to Ber Sheva prison in response
to the hunger strike.<br><br>
Detainees said they would escalate their protest if the IPS did not
respond to their demands, which began in April against humiliating
treatment of relatives visiting detainees and banning Gaza prisons from
family visitation rights for over four years, coinciding with the capture
of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit by Palestinian operatives in Gaza.
<br><br>
Prisoners across Israeli jails have boycotted family visits throughout
April, and many have participated in the hunger strike. Further hunger
strikes are expected to commence on 17 and 27 April.<br><br>
******************************************<br>
<b>Addameer call for demonstrations on April 18th at ICRC offices! Demand
that the ICRC take public action against Israel's treatment of
Palestinian political prisoners! <br>
<a href="http://www.addameer.org/addameer/campaigns/icrc.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.addameer.org/addameer/campaigns/icrc.html<br><br>
</a></b>7500 Palestinians are currently being held as political prisoners
by Israel, including around 344 Palestinian children and 115 Palestinian
women. These prisoners face forms of torture and mistreatment during
their arrest and detention, and are consistently denied family and lawyer
visits. <br><br>
April 17th is the International Day in Solidarity with Palestinian
Political Prisoners. It is marked by demonstrations through out the
Occupied Territories with families demanding the release of prisoners.
Many of these demonstrations take place outside the offices of the
International Committee of the Red Cross, as this body is responsible for
maintaining contact with prisoner! s, as well as delivering clothes and
other essential items. This year in solidarity with Palestinian political
prisoners and their families we call on all Palestine solidarity groups
and prisoners solidarity groups to hold demonstrations and deliver a
letter of protest to ICRC missions on April 18th (April 17th falls on a
Sunday). <br><br>
We are calling on the ICRC to take more meaningful steps in the
monitoring of prisoner conditions. Despite the grave violations of
prisoner rights that take place in Israeli prisons, the ICRC mission in
the West Bank and Gaza Strip is not carrying out frequent visits to
central Israeli prisons and has failed to deliver urgently needed
supplies. <br><br>
We call for demonstrations at ICRC offices to demand that the ICRC take
public action and let the world know what is happening to Palestinian
political prisoners inside Israeli jails and detention centers. <br><br>
We call on all Palestine solidarity groups and prisoners support groups
to endorse this day of action and sign onto a letter being delivering to
the ICRC. To endorse or receive more information please contact
<a href="http://sumoud.tao.ca/" eudora="autourl">http://sumoud.tao.ca</a>
<br>
<a name="whatyoucando"></a><br>
</font><h2><b>WHAT YOU CAN DO</b></h2><font size=3>1. As prisoner support
organizations in Palestine are demonstrating outside local ICRC offices
we must come together in the Palestine solidarity movement to support
them and the prisoners. Join other groups all over the world on April 18
to organize a demonstration at an ICRC office in your area. Sumoud
Political Prisoner Solidarity Group can provide you with resources
(letter to ICRC, fact-sheets, event poster, press release, powerpoint
presentation and video for educationals around the topic). Information
available at
<a href="http://sumoud.tao.ca/" eudora="autourl">http://sumoud.tao.ca</a>
<br><br>
2. Sign an online petition being delivered to the ICRC on April 18 at
<a href="http://www.petitiononline.com/sumoud/petition.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.petitiononline.com/sumoud/petition.html</a> <br><br>
3. Organize a Call-in / Fax Day to the ICRC on April 18. Below is a list
of central ICRC delegation contacts and a sample letter that can be faxed
/ emailed and used for talking points when making phone calls. <br>
<a name="contact"></a><br>
</font><h2><b>CONTACT</b></h2><font size=3>UNITED STATES, Washington DC
(covers U.S.A. and Canada)<br>
Tel.: (+1) 202 293 94 30<br>
Fax: (+1) 202 293 94 31<br>
E-mail washington.was@icrc.org<br><br>
GENEVA <br>
Tel.: 41 22 730 2282<br>
Fax: ++ 41 (22) 733 20 57<br>
Email: anotari.gva@icrc.org<br><br>
PALESTINE / ISRAEL<br>
JERUSALEM<br>
Tel.: (+972 2) 582 88 45 / 582 84 41<br>
Fax: (+972 2) 581 13 75<br>
jerusalem.jer@icrc.org<br><br>
GAZA<br>
Tel.: (+972) 57 756 860<br>
Mobile: (+972) 59 60 30 15<br>
<a name="sample"></a><br>
</font><h2><b>SAMPLE LETTER</b></h2><font size=3>Dear Sir/Madam:<br>
I address this letter to you on the occasion of Palestinian Prisoner Day,
April 17, 2005. As the guardians of international humanitarian law, the
ICRC is responsible "
to take cognizance of any complaints based on
alleged breaches of that law" (Article 5.2c of the Statutes of
International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement). In the case of
Palestinian prisoners however, this responsibility has quite clearly not
been fulfilled. It appears to us that the ICRC has preferred to quietly
accept Israel's considerable and increasing violations of the rights of
Palestinian prisoners without taking any meaningful action. <br><br>
It appears that the ICRC has quietly accepted Israeli restrictions on
which prisoners they can visit. Furthermore, the ICRC visits take place
in official 'visiting areas' and do not include any kind of monitoring of
the prison and detention conditions inside the prison/detention centre as
a whole (through, for example, walk-throughs of the general prison
areas). I believe this would be a simple and effective way of placing
pressure on the Israeli prison administrations to improve the conditions
in these prisons. <br><br>
In particular, I am concerned about cases such as Palestinian female
prisoner Manal Naji Mahmoud Ghanim, 29 years old from Tulkarem, and her
child Nour, 1 and a half years old, who have been imprisoned since 17
April 2003. Both Manal and Nour are being held in Telmond Prison. Manal,
who suffers from Thalasemia, was arrested while she was pregnant. Taken
away from her family in handcuffs, Manal delivered Nour in an Israeli
hospital. The prison administration does not provide Manal and Nour with
the special medical care they require, nor does it provide Nour with the
milk he needs as his mother cannot breast-feed him. <br><br>
While I understand that Israel places very real obstacles in front of the
work of the ICRC, this situation must be urgently addressed. I therefore
call on you to immediately take steps to fulfill the following measures:
<br><br>
*To take effective and public action to end the practice of Israel's
incarceration of Palestinian prisoners from the West Bank and Gaza Strip
in areas outside of the occupied territories. <br><br>
*To take effective and public action against Israel's widespread use of
torture against Palestinian detainees. <br><br>
*To immediately demand that sick and injured prisoners are provided with
adequate and appropriate medical treatment. <br><br>
*To urgently increase the frequency of visits by the ICRC to Israeli
prisons.<br><br>
*To insist that visits by ICRC staff to Israeli prisons also include the
provision of urgently needed items such as clothes, underwear, shoes,
sanitary products and educational materials.<br><br>
*To pressure Israel to allow unobstructed family visits by Palestinians
from the West Bank and Gaza Strip to their relatives in Israeli jails.
Most importantly, these visits should take place unobstructed by glass or
other barriers.<br><br>
*To increase the visibility of the work of the ICRC to the Palestinian
public, in particular the actions you carry out around the above
measures. This should be done in much closer coordination with
Palestinian human rights organizations. <br><br>
While I understand fully the ICRC concerns over confidentiality in
regards to your work, I would appreciate an official response to these
concerns. I seek some indication that the ICRC is aware of these concerns
and is taking steps to address them. If these complaints over the ICRC
mission are inaccurate and unrepresentative of your activities then I
would greatly appreciate further clarification. <br><br>
Sincerely,<br><br>
</font><h2><b>***************************************<br>
PFLP: Support hunger striking prisoners in occupation
jails</b></h2><font size=3>
<a href="http://www.pflp.ps/english/?q=pflp-support-hunger-striking-prisoners-occupation" eudora="autourl">
http://www.pflp.ps/english/?q=pflp-support-hunger-striking-prisoners-occupation</a>
-<br><br>
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine expressed its support
for Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike inside the occupation jails in
the "battle of the empty stomachs" on April 7, 2010. The
prisoners' hunger strike demanded an end to occupation abuses of
prisoners' rights and recognition of the political and legal rights of
Palestinian prisoners as prisoners of war and freedom fighters imprisoned
for their struggle for self-determination. <br><br>
The PFLP said that this strike is a clear message from the masses of
prisoners in the Zionist jails to all Palestinian, Arab and international
institutions, including human rights organizations, the International
Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations to take action. The
prisoners' action, the PFLP said, sheds light on the violations of the
Geneva Conventions taking place in Israeli prisons as well as the ongoing
denial of family visits and abuses of prisoners and their families, and
brutal prison conditions. The Front noted that the occupier daily
tramples prisoners' rights, meeting only silence from the
"international community" and its alleged protectors of
"democracy and human rights."<br><br>
The Front's statement praised the prisoners' spirit of unity in this
struggle, including prisoners from all political factions and parties,
and called for our civil, popular and official organizations to mirror
the prisoners' unity at Palestinian, Arab and international levels to
uphold their rights and expose the truth of the racist, aggressive
practices of the occupation and to struggle for and secure the national
rights of our people - the right to return, to self-determination, to
independence - and thwart the occupier's plans to suppress the
Palestinian struggle and demoralize our people. <br><br>
The PFLP affirmed the necessity of dedicating serious actions
through 2010 to the freedom of the prisoners, through upgrading the
role of the prisoners' movement in the political leadership of our people
and ensuring a national agenda that focuses on achieving prisoners'
freedom, protecting their rights and those of their families, and
emphasizing their profound role in the struggle for national liberation.
<br><br>
<br><br>
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