More than 1700 detainees, held by Israel, continued their open-ended hunger strike for the 24th consecutive day, in several Israeli prisons, while Israeli continues to refuse their legitimate demands.
The Palestinian Prisoners’ Society and the Detainees’ Committee have reported that some of the striking detainees started refraining from drinking water for several hours at a time, due to the increasing difficulties they face just by trying to walk to the toilets, including when trying to refill their water bottles.
The Israeli Prison Authority has also started transferring many striking detainees from solitary confinement in Ramla prison to a field clinic that lacks basic supplies and medical professionals.
It also prevented, again, one of the lawyers of the Palestinian Detainees’ Committee from visiting detained leader Marwan Barghouthi, who is in solitary confinement at the al-Jalama prison.
The detainees are demanding basic rights, guaranteed by International Law and the Fourth Geneva Convention, while Israel continues to reject their demands and is imposing various restrictions on them, including repeated transfers, denying them visits with their families or lawyers, and forcing many of them in solitary confinement.
Among the main demands of the detainees are ending solitary confinement and Administrative Detention policies (holding them captive without charges or trial), providing them with professional and adequate medical care, and direct body contact with their visiting family members, in addition to regular, uninterrupted visits.
