THE LEADERSHIP of the Palestinian prisoners’ movement announced on Tuesday 21 March, that they would begin the collective hunger strike with up to 2,000 prisoners and more on the days to come.
36 days ago the freedom fighters started steps against the repressive measures, refusing to abide by certain rules.
They are demanding not only an end to the attacks by the Ben Gvir, Smotrich and Netanyahu far right regime on the prisoners, but their freedom.
The Higher Emergency Committee of the Palestinian Prisoners’ Movement declared in its statement: ‘We have decided to embark on our open hunger strike, “the Volcano of Freedom or Martyrdom” to shout our hunger and steadfastness to the world with one, sole voice: Freedom, freedom, freedom!’
The Emergency committee stated that the leadership of the prisoners’ movement would begin the strike today, represented by the Committee members, which represents the broad spectrum of Palestinian politics.
The members of the Committee who launched their strike today are: Ammar Mardi, representative of Fateh (Palestinian National Liberation Movement), Salameh al-Qatawi, representative of Hamas (Islamic Resistance Movement) Ziad Bseiso, representative of the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine Walid Hanatsheh, Representative of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine Wajdi Joudeh, representative of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Bassam Khandaqji, representative of the Palestinian People’s Party.
These six representatives were joined in launching the strike by Mohammed al-Tus, the longest-held Palestinian prisoner jailed since 1985.
Palestinian prisoner Khader Adnan is already on his 45th day of hunger strike, which he launched at the moment of his arrest.
A series of Palestinian leaders from across political movements declared that they will participate in the hunger strike in its front ranks, including: Ahmad Sa’adat, the General Secretary of the PFLP; Bassam al-Saadi of Islamic Jihad; leaders of Fateh, including Zakaria Zubaidi, one of the heroes of the Freedom Tunnel, and Marwan Barghouthi, also leaders of Hamas, including Hassan Salameh, and Mohammed Arman.
Nael Barghouthi, the veteran Palestinian prisoner held for the longest time in total following his re-arrest after release in the Wafa’a al-Ahrar prisoner exchange, was also announced as a leader of the strike.
The occupation prison administration has already threatened to impose heavy penalties on the striking prisoners, even as the prisoners affirmed that they will continue their battle with determination.
Meanwhile, a joint press release from the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) and the Palestinian Water Authority (PWA) says that because Israel controls over 85 per cent of the Palestinian water in the occupied territories, Palestinian residents are being forced to buy their water from the Israeli water company, Mekorot against their wishes.
The statement added that In 2021, they purchased what amounted to 22% of the water available in Palestine, while the rest of the water needs came from Palestinian springs, groundwater wells, and desalinated drinking water.
The PCBS and PWA said that the average Palestinian water consumption per capita is still less than the minimum recommended level globally according to the standards of the World Health Organisation, which is 100 litres per day.
This is a result of the Israel’s control over more than 85% of Palestinian water.
The daily allocation per capita from consumed water for domestic purposes is 86.3 litres per person per day in Palestine in 2021 (89 litres in the West Bank, and 82.7 litres in the Gaza Strip).
Fresh water only making up 21.3 litres for an average Palestinian a day because the water is often polluted or has salt in it so is not fit for human consumption.
When comparing this rate with the Israeli daily allocation per capita, we note that the Israeli daily allocation per capita is more than three times that of a Palestinian which is about 300 litres per day, and this rate doubles for Israeli settlers to more than seven times than Palestinian per person consumption.
The amount of water abstracted from the coastal aquifer in the Gaza Strip was 192.5 million cubic metres (MCM) in 2021.
This quantity is obtained via unsafe pumping that jeopardises the sustainability of the source, as the basin sustainable yield should not exceed 50-60 MCM a year, where the groundwater level in the coastal aquifer reached 19 metres below sea level leading to the depletion of groundwater reserves.
This led to 97 per cent of the water pumped from the coastal aquifer in the Gaza Strip not meeting the water quality standards of the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Elsewhere, Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said on Tuesday said that the Israeli occupation is the basis of evil, and the region will not enjoy stability unless the occupation ends, saying that killing the two-state solution will lead to a perpetual apartheid and lead to more tension and the outbreak of conflicts.
Safadi was responding to a speech by the Israel Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich in which he said: ‘There is no such thing as a Palestinian nation’ and that ‘there is no Palestinian history’.
Safadi added that Jordan has always been clear in protecting its interests and rights, and that the right of the Palestinian people to exist is not cancelled by extremist statements that the world stands against.
The Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriate Affairs had summoned the Israeli ambassador in Amman, after Smoltrich’s speech on Monday which Safadi said represented a reckless act of incitement, and informed him that this represented an extremist racist act and a violation of international norms and the Jordanian-Israeli peace treaty.
The official spokesman for the Jordanian Jordanian Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Sinan Al-Majali, stated that the Israeli ambassador had been informed of a strongly worded letter of protest, which he would immediately convey to his government.
In an angry statement to the Speaker of the Jordanian Parliament, Ahmed Al-Safadi, added: ‘The Israeli occupation government is still demonstrating its approach and tendency to extremism and escalation.
‘It has once again shown its racist and intolerant outlook through one of its serving ministers.
‘The occupation government’s finance minister’s use of a map of what is called Israel, which includes the borders of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and the occupied Palestinian territories, is something that cannot be tolerated, and we call on the government to take all measures to repel these extremist steps, which violate the peace treaty and constitute a breach of international norms.’
The Jordanian Council of Bar Associations also condemned the statement of the extremist Zionist minister, Smotrich, and his use of an expansionist colonial map, as an explicit call for incitement to terrorism, ethnic cleansing and chaos in the region.
The Council called on the countries of the world to denounce and reject these dangerous statements, and to combat inflammatory ideology, hate speech and expansionist approaches.
He stressed that the Palestinian people are an indigenous people rooted in their land for thousands of years, and people like Smotrich will not be able to distort and falsify these facts or deny this authentic existence of the Palestinian people.
- Settlers from the ‘Taj Mahir/Price Tag’ group on Tuesday morning wrote racist slogans on a truck and two vehicles in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood.
Palestinian residents were angered by the racist slogans which included one that said ‘death to all Arabs’ and the drawing of six-pointed stars on vehicles and a truck in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood, and the tyres of at least six vehicles were also slashed.
Anwar al-Julani, a resident of the neighbourhood, said that the police came to his house in the morning and demanded that he check the surveillance cameras, and then confiscated the recording device from this family members.
Al-Jolani added that the police informed him that two settlers vandalised cars and wrote slogans at 3am.
For his part, Abu Ramadan Al-Saou explained that the people of the neighbourhood guard their neighbourhood on a daily basis due to the repeated attacks of the settlers.
The racist attacks come on the same day that Palestinians in the town of Deir Ballout west of the northen West Bank city of Salfit were ordered to stop construction work on houses for several hours as the Israeli army said that they did not have the legal permit need to build them.
A number of Palestinians were also to stop the construction of sheds and barns in a move that was condemned by the Mayor of Deir Ballout Sameer Nimer.
