In a statement issued by Dr.Ramzi Khoury, President of the Higher Presidential Committee of Churches Affairs in Palestine and Director General of the Palestinian National Fund, “the prisoners and detainees in the prisons of the Israeli occupation are the forefront of the Palestinian people’s struggle towards freedom, independence and the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital”.
The Palestinian Prisoner’s Day will remain a nationalday celebrated by our people within our homeland and in the diaspora, as an affirmation of the legitimacy of our struggle and the centrality of ourcause.
The cause of the prisoners will remain one of the top priorities of the Palestinian people, in fulfilment of their struggle and national sacrifices for the sake of our freedom.
On this day, we affirm the importance to unify national and international efforts and various activities to support them and support our legitimate right to freedom.
The prisoners inside the occupation prisons live in extreme harsh conditions and are subjected to continuous violations, most notably physical and psychological torture, solitary isolation, deliberate medical negligence and denial of visitation, all which are in violation of international law and human rights conventions.
The Committee called on human rights institutions around the world to force the occupying power to oblige to the international law related to the rights of prisoners and detainees, especially in light of the covid-19 pandemic and the lack of medical supplies and insufficient health care for the prisoners.
The International Committee of the Red Cross appealed to send committees to investigate the conditions of the prisoners, calling on international human rights, humanitarian and health institutions to urgently intervene to stop the slow death of about 350 Palestinian prisoners suffering from chronic diseases that the occupying power refuses to release.
