WEST BANK (Arab News) –
Hundreds of Palestinians held without charge in the Zionist regime’s jails are boycotting court hearings over the practice of the so-called administrative detention.
The detention orders can last for a maximum of six months, but are often renewed, effectively keeping prisoners in indefinite detention.
The boycott began after Hisham Abu Hawash, a father of five jailed without charge or trial under administrative detention, reached the 138th day of a hunger strike. His family and friends say that “his life and health are at risk” and that “the Israeli occupation bears full responsibility for his survival.”
Daoud Shehab, the spokesman of the Gaza-based Islamic Jihad resistance group, warned the Zionist regime against the consequence of possible death of hunger-striking Abu Hawash.
“If Abu Hawash is martyred, the Islamic Jihad movement will consider it an assassination operation,” Shehab told al-Mayadeen.
Sources told the TV network that Hamas has told the Egyptians that if the suffering of Abu Hawash intensifies, the situation will escalate against the Zionists.
A statement issued by the prisoners’ leadership committee said an agreement was reached to initiate the boycott of Zionist courts from Jan. 1.
Hind Shraydeh, whose husband Obay Aboudi was detained two years ago, told Arab News of the pain of raising three children without their father.
“Administrative detention has nothing to do with law or justice. Your family, your life, your children and your work are affected by the mood of the Israeli military commander who signs the administrative detention order,” she said.
Shraydeh supports the boycott, saying that it “is the only option left.”
She added: “Prisoners have tried hunger strikes, which changed nothing. There is no other option left with the prisoners and their families because we all know the results of the court cases anyway, so why should we give them the facade of claiming to be a democracy when they are not.”
Rami Fadayel’s case is another example of arbitrary detention. He has been administratively detained seven times, his mother, Muna Fadayel, told Arab News.
“With the last arrest, however, they decided to charge him. They confiscated his printing press after finding a receipt at the medical relief committee. They charged him — without proof — with supporting terror,” she said.
The evidence against her son, she added, “is so flimsy” that the Zionists will most likely fail to convict him, but will use “administrate detention” to keep him behind bars.
“He is 42 and his 14-year-old daughter has barely seen him out of jail due to the successive administrative detention orders that are regularly slapped on Palestinians,” she told Arab News.
Palestinian member of the Knesset Sami Abu Shehadeh told Arab News that the Joint Arab List believes that the practice of the so-called administrative detention is “simply the kidnapping of Palestinians by Israel.”