Parents of detainees imprisoned by Israel protest in front to the Tulkarem office of the Red Cross

Tuesday August 28, 2007 22:56 by Moeen Shadeed – IMEMC

Parents of dozens of detainees and representatives of several institutions and human rights groups in Tulkarem, in the northern part of the West Bank, held a procession in from of the Tulkarem office of the Red Cross demanding Israel to release their imprisoned family members.

Archive Photo by the PPS

The protesters carrier posters and pictures of their beloved detained family members, and demanded the international community, human rights groups and the Red Cross to intervene and end the suffering of the Palestinian detainees who are imprisoned by Israel under conditions and violations that violate the international law and the basic principles of human rights.

Haleema Rmeilat, head of the Tulkarem office of the Palestinian Prisoner Society (PPS), stated that the detainees are subjected to continuous attacks by the soldiers, and that they are being punished for no apparent reasons, while the prison canteen is empty and the food provided to them by the prison administration is insufficient and is many cases is corrupt.

Rmeilat added that the Israeli government should be pressured in order to release all the detainees who are sentenced to high terms, the sick detainees, children and women as a first stage prior to releasing all political detainees in its prisons and detention facilities.

Mother of detainee Kamal Al Shalaby, from Tulkarem refugee camp, said that her imprisoned son is in a very bad health condition due to infections in his ears and that he needs immediate medical attention while the prison administration told him that they might send him to a hospital for surgery by the end of this year.

Mother of detainee Hatim Al Jayyousi said that the Israeli Prison Administration keeps barring the families from visiting their detained family members.

Brother of detainee Ibrahim Nimir, from Nour Shams refugee camp, stated that all human rights groups and institutions that defend the rights of the detainees imprison by Israel should practice pressures on the Israeli authorities to end the detainees’ file by releasing all of the political prisons.

Moreover, families of detainees from Tulkarem met with representatives of the International Red Cross in the area and informed them of the bad and inhuman conditions the detainees are facing in Israeli prisons.

The families demanded that the Red Cross practices pressure on the Israel authorities to provide the detainees with their rights guaranteed by the international law and the Fourth Geneva conventions.

It is worth mentioning that there are 1250 detainees from Tulkarem district imprisoned in several Israeli prisons and detention facilities. 70 of them were kidnapped this month. More than 10.000 Palestinian detainees are currently impsioned by israel.

Translated By Saed Bannoura - IMEMC

tulkarem | prisoners | news report saed at imemc dot org