Date:5 May 2022
Press Release
An urgent appeal, calling on you to take immediate action to release the Palestinian detainee “Khalil Al-Awawda”, who is on hunger strike since March 3, 2022 to this moment, and being subjected to torture, ill-treatment and deliberate medical neglect in the prisons of the Israeli occupation
The International Commission to Support Palestinians’ Rights (ICSPR) highly appreciates your well-known keenness, in order to put an end to human suffering. With reference to the above subject, we are addressing you today to inform you of the dangerous and catastrophic complications that the 40-year-old Palestinian detainee Al-Awawda suffers from. Al-Awawda, is a married man and a father of four girls, he continues his hunger strike in protest of his administrative detention for the 71st consecutive day, where the occupation authorities arrested him on December 27, 2021, and an administrative detention order was issued against him for a period of 6 months, without any charges being brought against him. He had previously been arrested several times since 2002, and this is the fifth arrest, including three administrative detentions.
the International Commission for Supporting Palestinian Rights (ICSPR) sent all the institutions of the international community Among them: UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences , UN Special Rapporteur on arbitrary detention , UN Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment , Secretary-General of the United Nations ,Secretary-General of the Organization of the League of Arab States , Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation , High Commissioner for Human Rights ,UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory , Director of the Red Cross Mission in the Palestinian Territories.
His lawyer filed an appeal against the decision confirming his administrative detention. On 17/4/2022, Ofer Court rejected the appeal and maintained his administrative detention decision.
A petition was submitted to the Supreme Court and a session was set for him on 05/03/2022, and later the court decided in the session to transfer him to a civil hospital and did not issue a decision to cancel or end his administrative detention. So far, no decision has been issued regarding the petition submitted by his lawyer to release him.
:We send you this urgent appeal at a time when the detainee “Khalil Al-Awawda” is exposed to severe complications as follows
- As a result of the deteriorating health condition of the detainee as a result of his continuous hunger strike, he was transferred from “Ramla” prison to the Israeli “Asaf Harofeh” hospital, then he was returned to Ramle prison, where the occupation authorities refused to keep him in the Assaf Harofeh Hospital despite his urgent need for urgent health follow-up.
- Despite the dangerous health situation that Awawda has reached, the occupation authorities refuse to respond to his demand to end his administrative detention, and to this day there are no signs of serious solutions to his case.
- “Al-Awawda” and about (750) other sick detainees suffer from medical neglect and a policy of denial of their minimum rights, and things got more complicated under the occupation’s enactment of racist legislation aimed at undermining their dignity, foremost of which is the law to freeze funding medical treatment for detainees and the injured in December 2018, in a compound violation of international and humanitarian laws, which leads to killing Palestinian prisoners and detainees with premeditation.
- According to the last visit to Awawda in Ramle prison, it was confirmed that he suffers from very difficult health conditions and that his body is deteriorating from severe pain, and the abusive measures implemented by the occupation prisons administration against him are exacerbating the situation.
- Awawda is currently suffering from a fragile and anxious psychological condition, and he needs people to stand in solidarity with him by making good and serious efforts, in order to release him and live freely outside the bars of captivity.
We look to your interventions as a banner to ensure that members of the international community fulfill their obligations towards respecting human rights standards, foremost among which is the condemnation of all kinds of grave violations to which prisoners and detainees are subjected in Israeli occupation prisons, especially arbitrary administrative detention, torture and medical negligence.
We call on you to condemn and prevent these practices and violations, investigate, and take appropriate and effective measures to prevent the escalation of violations by the Israeli occupation forces, which contributes to preventing further escalation in the region.
We also call on you to exert more efforts, by taking urgent and serious measures that would put pressure on the Israeli authorities to release the Palestinian detainee “Khalil Al-Awawda”, to stop all violations to which he is exposed.
We hope that you will take actions now, as tomorrow, it might be too late.
