Hunger Striking Palestinian Detainee Ends Hunger Strike

Hunger striking Palestinian detainee in Israeli jails Sami Janazreh has ended his 69-day hunger strike against administrative detention, without a charge or trial, according to the Detainees and Ex-Detainees Commission.

The Commission said Janazreh’s decision to end his hunger strike came after the Israeli general prosecutor decided to file an indictment against him, which means that his detention without charge or trial could be replaced by a fixed detention term.

Janazreh recently saw a significant deterioration in his health due to his hunger strike, as he had refused to receive any food supplements or salts and only relied on water. He had also refused to undergo any medical examination.

There are more than 500 Palestinian prisoners being held under administrative detention, a controversial Israeli practice that allows detention of Palestinians without charge or trial for up to sex-month intervals that can be renewed indefinitely.

Israeli officials claim the practice is an essential tool in preventing attacks and protecting sensitive intelligence, but it has been strongly criticized by the international community as well as by both Israeli and Palestinian rights groups.

The Israeli human rights organization, B’Tselem, said international law stipulates that administrative detention may be exercised only in very exceptional cases. Nevertheless, Israeli authorities routinely employ administrative detention on thousands of Palestinians.

Israel uses administrative detention regularly as a form of collective punishment and mass detention of Palestinians, and frequently uses administrative detention when it fails to obtain confessions in interrogations of Palestinian detainees.

Palestinian detainees have continuously resorted to open-ended hunger strikes as a way to protest their illegal administrative detention and to demand an end to this policy, which violates international law.

Source: WAFA