The Israeli scientist who recently had the honor of being the first woman to win a Nobel Prize for Chemistry said that she believes Israel should release the eleven thousand Palestinians it is currently holding in prison camps.Professor Ada Yonath told Israeli reporters that holding these Palestinians in prison for months and years without charges builds resentment among their friends and relatives.
Yonath said that the imprisonment of Palestinians without charge builds resentment that can lead to terrorist acts.
She said that the prisoner release should not be contingent on the release of the one Israeli being held by Palestinian resistance fighters, but should be done simply because it is unjust for Israel to continue to hold these prisoners.
Most of the Palestinians imprisoned by the Israeli government are kept in open-air prison camps in the Negev desert, where multiple human rights and aid agencies have documented abuse and ill-treatement.
Many Palestinian prisoners have also provided evidence of torture at the hands of Israeli prison guards.
