ISRAELI warplanes early Saturday carried out several air strikes targeting different locations in the Gaza Strip, injuring Palestinians and causing destruction to Palestinian properties.
A WAFA correspondent reported that F16 Israeli warplanes fired at least one missile targeting the transmission tower of the civil administration’s building, east of Jabalia Refugee Camp to the north of the strip, injuring a Palestinian. He was transferred to hospital for medical treatment.
The air strike, which spread fear and panic among Palestinians, particularly children, caused massive damage to properties. Another warplane targeted with at least two missiles a location to southeast of Gaza city, causing damages to properties. No injuries were reported. Israeli warplanes further targeted a water tank in the town of Beit Hanoun to the north of the strip, seriously damaging it.
Meanwhile, an Israeli reconnaissance plane fired a missile targeting agricultural land to the north of the strip, however, no casualties were reported. Israeli forces claimed that the attack came in response to two missiles that were fired from Gaza toward Israeli settlements located near Gaza borderline.
The Israeli air strikes came as tension remained high in the city of Jerusalem and the West Bank. Israeli police have been carrying out attacks against Palestinian worshippers at al-Aqsa mosque compound. Many injuries among worshippers and damages to historic religious properties within the mosque’s compound were reported.
In July 2014, Israel carried out 51 days of bloody aggression against the Gaza Strip. Over 2,160 Palestinians were killed – and some 11,000 injured – during Israel’s seven-week military onslaught which caused the Gaza Strip an estimated $5 billion in economic losses, according to Palestinian government figures.
Gaza still suffers from the repercussions of the Israeli aggression which took place in the summer of 2014; the infrastructure along with thousands of homes were completely destroyed, displacing thousands of families who up until the moment live in caravans on the rubble of their homes.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian consensus government condemned the Israeli authorities’ escalation policy committed against the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank, stressing that such measures come as part of the Israeli government’s efforts aimed at undermining international political efforts and the two-state solution, as well as to kill off any chance for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.
It called upon the international community and relevant United Nations organisations to intervene and compel Israel to stop its violations in the occupied Palestinian Territory, the latest of which was the series of air strikes carried out against the Gaza Strip on Friday, as well as the Israeli settlers’ continued provocative raids into al-Aqsa mosque compound.
The government stressed that the only viable way to end the Israeli occupation of Palestinian Territory is through establishing an independent Palestinian state within the pre-1967 borders and with East Jerusalem as its capital. Also on Saturday the open-ended hunger strike of seven Palestinian detainees in protest against their administrative detention without charge and trial in Israeli jails entered its 30th consecutive day, said the Palestinian Detainees and Ex-detainees Committee on Saturday.
The committee said in a press statement that the seven detainees, who have stopped taking nutrients continue to be held in solitary confinement amidst very poor hygiene conditions. The six of the seven detainees are identified as lawyer Nidal Abu Akr, 45, detained in Ashkelon prison, Bilal al-Saifi, detained in Majeddo prison, Ghassan Zawahra, 32, detained in Eshel prison, Bader al-Ruzza, and Munir Abu Sharrar, both detained in al-Naqab (Negev) prison, Sahdi Ma’ali, 39, detained in Dekel prison, and Salman Skafi, detained in Nafha prison.
The committee added that the seven detainees are facing an imminent life-threatening danger as a result of their ongoing detention by the Israeli prison services with criminal prisoners, in order to force them to end their hunger strike. The detainees, according to the committee’s press statement, have lost a great deal of their weight and have become incapable of moving and standing up. They have also been suffering from sharp pains.
Furthermore, other Palestinian detainees, who refrained from taking their meals in solidarity with the aforementioned prisoners, threatened to start an open-ended hunger strike if the Israeli government would not meet the hunger-strikers’ demands. Meanwhile, the committee noted that the health situation of Ahed Abu Dayyak, 33, who is sentenced to three life sentences and 30 years in jail, has sharply deteriorated as a result of deliberate medical negligence by the Israeli prison administration.
The committee explained that Abu Dayyak underwent a tumour excision surgery on his intestines in Israeli Soroka medical centre, where doctors removed almost 80 centimetres of his large bowl.
It explained that Abu Dayyak was not provided with the crucial medical care at Soroka centre, adding that they transferred him to another hospital too early, given the severity of his medical condition.
The committee said Abu Dayyak was later moved to al-Ramala hospital in an unfit vehicle, which caused him a severe surgical wound infection. As a result, he was moved to Asaf Haroveh hospital. He is still laying in a coma connected to a ventilator to assist his breathing, where his medical condition remains critical. This came ten days after some of the seven hunger strikers demanded that an international committee of inquiry be formed in order to investigate their arbitrary administrative detention of Palestinian detainees by Israeli Prison Service (IPS).
The detainees started their open-ended hunger strike on August 20 and have warned that if IPS fails to end their administrative detention they would stop taking liquids as well. The committee noted in a previous report that the health condition of hunger-striking detainees is ‘seriously deteriorating’ and that it has requested the Red Cross to intervene in order for them to be hospitalised. Highlighting the deteriorating health condition of Abu Akr, the committee had revealed that Abu Akr, who is a father of three children and has been held in administrative detention since 28 June 2014, has lost 10 kilograms and has been suffering from stomach and arterial problems and high cholesterol.
Abu Akr previously underwent a knee replacement surgery and used to take five types of medication. He has already warned that he and the rest of hunger strikers would boycott Israeli courts for holding false and unjust trials. The committee had also explained in a previous report that the detainees would not end their hunger strike unless a set of demands is met.
The hunger strikers demanded the abolition of detention without charge or trial, the formation of an international committee of inquiry to be tasked with investigating the arbitrary administrative detention, the provision of emotional and financial compensation for administrative detainees and the termination of the Israeli force-feeding law.
Under administrative detention rules, Israel may detain Palestinians without charge or trial and on the basis of secret evidence for up to six months, indefinitely renewable by Israeli military courts. The use of administrative detention dates back to the emergency laws of the British colonial era in Palestine, said the Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network.
Many human rights groups have accused Israel of using administrative detention as a routine form of collective punishment against Palestinians, as well as using it when failing to obtain confessions during interrogation.
There are around 500 detainees serving administrative detention in Israeli jails. Palestinian detainees have continuously resorted to open-ended hunger strikes as a way to protest against their illegal administrative detention and to demand an end to this policy, which violates international law.