Clashes outside Ofer prison (Yotam Ronen / Activestills)

The main protest today occurred outside Ofer Prison, just outside Ramallah, in support of Samer Issawi, who has not eaten since July 29, 2012, along with the rest of the Palestinians on hunger strike. Hundreds of Palestinians, including MK Ahmad Tibi, Palestinian MP Mustafa Barghouti and Islamic leader Sheikh Raed Salah gathered near Ofer at noon for a Friday prayer before marching toward the prison,some  confronting army forces with stones. Forces made extensive use of tear gas canisters, injuring many, and also shot live ammunition, sending at least two demonstrators to the hospital. A Palestinian journalist was also wounded, according to several reports.

Tear gas outside Ofer prison (Oren Ziv / Activestills)

Similar yet somewhat calmer demonstrations also took place near the Jalame checkpoint in Jenin and around the Qalandiya checkpoint between Ramallah and Jerusalem. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas attended a protest tent in Ramallah and gave a speech about the importance of releasing prisoners as part of the Palestinian struggle.

Scouts supporting prisoners in Jenin (Ahmad Al-Bazz / Activestills)

The popular weekly demonstrations against the wall and settlements, attended by Israelis and internationals every Friday, were dedicated to solidarity with the prisoners. In Qaddum, four people were injured from being hit by tear gas canisters, reportedly shot at a direct trajectory. In Nabi Saleh one teenage girl was injured by rubber-coated bullets. In Ma’asara demonstrators broke through the line of soldiers regularly stationed at the entrance to the village and made it to the settlement of Efrat, where confrontations broke out with local settlers and security guards. In Bil’in some two dozen demonstrators marched to the wall, and were scattered by tear gas and “skunk” water.

Demonstrator overlooking wall and settlement in Bil’in (Haggai Matar)

Administrative detainees are held in prison without any charges being brought against them, on the sole accusation that they pose potential threats to the security of the country. In recent years, several such detainees went on prolonged hunger strikes, and were eventually released. Most famous were the cases of Khader Adnan, Hana Shalabi, and footballer Mahmoud Sarsak. Last year, the power of prisoner hunger strikes grew as thousands joined in strike to better prison conditions. Issawi, who has been on a hunger strike for 200 days, according to reports, is the longest of them all and physicians fear for his life.

Palestinian demonstrators staged a sit-in at the entrance to the United Nations offices in Ramallah Wednesday morning to protest inaction by the international body on behalf of the approximately 2,000 Palestinian prisoners now on hunger strike.

The sit-in, which was organized by the group Palestinians for Dignity, prevented UN employees from entering the offices in order to raise international awareness and bring about some type of action. In the early morning a small group of 20-30 people made up of the family members of prisoners, supporters and other activists attended the demonstration calling for protection from the UN instead of more aid.

PA security forces were deployed in the area. There were reports of threats in the beginning of the protest from security but no actual clashes have taken place.

Protests in support of the prisoners have been happening every day now for weeks, despite the hunger strikes having received very little media attention and virtually no response from governments around the world, including the United Nations. On Tuesday, another sit-in was staged in front of the Palestinian Authority presidential offices to protest inaction by the government.

Two prisoners, Thaer Halahleh and Bilal Diab, have passed the 70-day mark of their hunger strikes and could die at any time. Several others are close behind. Approximately 2,000 prisoners launched a collective hunger strike on April 17 in conjunction with the independent hunger strikes already taking place since Khader Adnan began his on December 18.

On Monday, Israel’s Supreme Court rejected appeals by Halahleh and Diab for release from their administrative detention, in which they are held without charge or trial. The court’s decision has made the deaths of the prisoners very likely and it is difficult to predict what the public response to such an outcome will be.

UPDATE:

Similar protests were reported to have taken place Wednesday at the UN offices in Jerusalem and Geneva. A small protest on the issue of hunger strikes was conducted at the gates to Tel Aviv University, as well.

Read also:
‘Empty stomachs’ hunger strike spreads across prisons 

Yesterday, I attended my first Palestinian demonstration across the Green Line, in front of Ramle Prison. Having been to many protests in the West Bank I was eager to assess the differences between the two events and how the Israeli authorities respond to each.

The day before, I had attended a demonstration in front of Ofer Prison near Ramallah. Both events were in support of the Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike in Israeli jails, and therefore, relatively parallel.

In the occupied West Bank, peaceable assembly by Palestinians is prohibited unless authorized by the Israeli military, which does not happen. Thus, any form of collective protest is dealt with harshly by the Israeli military, leaving Palestinians with no outlet for releasing public frustration or protesting for their basic rights.

On Wednesday, Palestinian demonstrators once again tried to reach Ofer prison in order to show their support for the approximately 2,000 Palestinian prisoners now on hunger strike in what has been billed the “Battle of Empty Stomachs.” Yet before the protest could even begin, the Israeli soldiers assembled on the road that leads to the prison began firing endless volleys of teargas canisters and excessive amounts of plastic-coated steel bullets.

I was nearly hit by these so-called “rubber” bullets on several occasions during the protest, even when I had moved from the front lines to a position in the back a few hundred meters from the soldiers. Some 20 Palestinians were reported injured. In the end, what could have been a peaceful demonstration and public expression of discontent devolved into riot control and stone throwing.

On Thursday in front of Ramle Prison, the scenario was much different. Peaceable assembly was permitted in the vicinity of the prison, to a small area designated by the Israeli police. There the protesters chanted slogans and displayed posters and flags for nearly an hour and a half.

When a bulk of the demonstrators tried to move beyond the metal grate fence erected for them, however, the police moved in quickly and aggressively, assaulting several of the protesters and arresting at least ten of them.

So, although people were allowed to protest, they were ultimately confined by police to a tiny space away from the public eye. As soon as the demonstrators moved outside their little box, the police pushed them back in using force—although without resorting to the type of extreme measures that are routinely used inside the occupied territories against the Palestinians with no rights. Those arrested were dealt with harshly, however, and reports from the jail said that the detainees were beaten by police far away from the watchful eye of the press cameras.

It is unmistakable that the protests are in many ways linked and reflective of how Palestinians are treated on the whole. Although those Palestinian citizens of Israel have more rights than their occupied counterparts, their voice is not appreciated and quickly silenced as soon as it attempts to speak not solely for its own sake but to influence those around them. Their rights protect them to some extent under the law but few would bat an eye if, and when, they are trampled on. Palestinians in the occupied territories are not even on the radar of Israelis and the military can deal with them as they see fit with virtual impunity. In the end, the grievances of all Palestinians are perceived as threatening and are crushed when they try to become more than just a show.

UPDATE:

It is worth noting that several of those arrested at the Ramle Prison demonstration were in fact Israeli Jews, who were not spared the treatment because of their background, but because of what they were demonstrating for. Many of them were the “anarchists” that face arrest often when they protest in the weekly village demonstrations of the West Bank. It will be interesting to hear the testimonies of those arrested to note what differences there may have been in the entire process of their arrest, detention, interrogation and release.

In the next few days, something momentous will occur. A group of Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike for over 60 days will either be released from incarceration in Israeli prison without charge or trial, or they will likely die.

And it will not end there, either. Many more have followed them down this perilous road of life, death and principle. In fact, thousands more.

Two Palestinians—Khader Adnan and Hana Shalabi—have already crossed the finish line, securing their release from prison—through deals cut with the Israeli government. Yet will Israel release any more, and in so doing, allow the military justice system, in place in the occupied territories for decades, to crumble?

Know their names. Bilal Diab. Thaer Halahleh. Hasan Safadi. Jafaar Izzedine. These men and thousands more men and women—prisoners with no rights—have usurped some of the power from their jailers and are challenging the system of imprisonment that has been used to subjugate Palestinians for nearly half a century.

Under the radar, Israeli leaders are scrambling for a way out. All types of measures have been used to break the will of hunger strikers, including excessive bouts of solitary confinement and psychological pressure aimed at weakening their resolve. The tactics have not worked. As thousands have joined the hunger strike movement it appears it has gone well beyond Israel’s ability to stop.

The future remains uncertain. Will the death of prisoners in Israel jails ignite the occupied territories or will they simply fizzle out? Although very little seems capable of mustering mainstream Palestinian society these days, the reaction to this eventuality is unpredictable. Prisoners are a decisive issue for Palestinians (read here). Moreover, as the peace process comes to an inglorious end, the status quo is increasingly fragile. The political and economic horizons for Palestinians are beginning to close once again. Times are changing.

LATE ADDITION:

One reader pointed out the connection to Bobby Sands and the IRA hunger strikes of the early 1980s. This connection was pointedly made during the 66-day hunger strike of Khader Adnan (coincidentally Sands would die of starvation on the 66th day of his own hunger strike). @RichardL also gave a link to a Guardian piece on the impact of the IRA hunger strikes, which ended in the deaths of 10 prisoners during Margaret Thatcher’s government and its impact.

The death of 10 men in the 1981 hunger strike was to prove a defining moment in the struggle between the Provisional IRA and the British government or, to be more precise, the prime minister, Margaret Thatcher.

The end of the strike after seven months was reported at the time as a victory for Thatcher’s fortitude. In fact, it proved to be the opposite. It boosted the ranks of the IRA, radicalised nationalist politics and can now be seen as the beginning of the process that led to Sinn Féin’s emergence as a vote-winning political party on either side of the disputed Irish border.

The article also discusses the English press’s coverage of the IRA hunger strikes. There is really little reason to discuss the Israeli press’s coverage of the hunger strike movement because it has been next to negligible. In the words of Haaretz columnist Akiva Eldar in an interview with me:

[Israelis] don’t give a shit. They think that they deserve it. And in the best case they should rot in a jail for the rest of their life. In the worst case they should be executed. And it is a waste of money to keep them there and to feed them.

This is the way they feel good with themselves. You see, most Israelis don’t really care about anything that is connected with Palestinians, or with ‘the other.’ They are so busy with their victimization, which they will never give up. So, prisoners are the victim of the occupation, victims of the violence, victims of the situation. But Israelis will never give up their right to be the victim. This is not only in regards to the prisoners, but to the occupation…

Yet the parallels to the IRA hunger strikes are remarkable. As the Guardian article notes:

But there was no genuine attempt to answer that question. Instead, the response was pitiless. “I will shed no tears when Sands dies,” wrote John Junor, then editor of the Sunday Express. “My only hope is that if and when he does every other IRA terrorist will go on the same sort of hunger strike in sympathy. And stay on it until they are all in wooden suits.”

As I reflect upon all this, I do it with the belief that the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians is steadily moving its way down a new path. The resolution of this conflict at the official levels of state, where they have worked to no avail for at least the last 20 years, is coming to an end. The people are once again taking action into their own hands. The hunger strike movement will do nothing for the legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority. But it will be a lightening rod in the hands of those who wish to continue to rally those inside Palestine and around the world to their cause.

Read also:
Palestinian Prisoners’ Day: Hundreds join hunger strike
Randa Adnan, wife of hunger striker, discusses her husband’s struggle
Palestinian Prisoners’ Day: The numbers
Khader Adnan agrees to stop hunger strike in exchange for April release

A movement of Palestinian prisoners protesting their incarceration and treatment inside Israeli prisons is continuing to reach momentous proportions. Billed the “War of Empty Stomachs,” the number of prisoners on hunger strike is now in the thousands.

On April 17, the prisoner movement split into two when between 1,200 and 1,600 prisoners launched a coordinated, open-ended hunger strike against their treatment inside Israeli prisons, including the pervasive use of solitary confinement, denied family visits and right to education. Another 2,000 joined in a limited solidarity hunger strike.

The prisoners had joined a group of hunger strikes launched independently by prisoners protesting their administrative detention—a policy by which Israel incarcerates Palestinians for periods of up to six months without evidence or trial, which can be renewed by a military judge indefinitely.

Galvanized by the hunger strike of Khader Adnan, beginning on December 18 and carried on by Hana Shalabi in February, the hunger strike movement is continuing to grow rapidly. At least seven prisoners are reaching dire health conditions, including Bilal Diab and Thaer Halahleh, who are on the 61st day of their hunger strikes. Hasan Safadi is on his 56th day, and others, including Omar Abu Shalal and Jafar Izzedine, are quickly approaching these lengths of time.

Khader Adnan’s hunger strike—which lasted 66 days, the longest in the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—opened the door for other prisoners after Israel decided to release him. He was joined near the end of his hunger strike by Hana Shalabi, whose hunger strike lasted 44 days before she was deported to Gaza in a release deal.

As more prisoners continue to approach the end of the road, Israel faces an increasingly difficult position. It can either follow suit with the two aforementioned hunger strikers and release more prisoners, or Israel can let them die in prison and potentially set off large-scale protests in the occupied territories. The latter choice also carries with it increased scrutiny on the practice of administrative detention, which is permitted under international law only in the most extreme cases. There are currently over 300 Palestinian prisoners held in administrative detention by Israel; the longest has been detained for over five years. At times, the number of prisoners has numbered in the thousands.

More prisoners have already declared they will begin open-ended hunger strikes this coming week, and demonstrations have begun to spread outside the occupied territories. One is scheduled for Thursday May 3 in front of the prison hospital in Ramle, Israel.

The latest hunger strikes have lacked the media coverage received by Khader Adnan and Hana Shalabi, both in the country and internationally. However this is likely to change in the coming days as several of them reach the end of the road and Israel is once again forced to choose which path it will take.

Click here to read more on the issue of Palestinian prisoners in an article I published in The National on Friday:

The centrality of the prisoner issue in Palestinian life has virtually no parallel anywhere else in the world. It is almost enough to note that the Palestinian Authority – the semiautonomous body that has governed the Palestinian territories since 1993 – has a ministry of prisoners’ affairs and that there are numerous social clubs, organisations and even a museum devoted to this cause.

For years, prisons have substituted as universities for large swathes of the population and provided a base for grassroots political organising. The country’s most popular political figure, Marwan Barghouti, is currently serving five life sentences but is still a likely contender for president. After close to 45 years of living under military occupation, where resistance is prized and collaboration with Israel is the ultimate crime, the stigma of prison has been transformed from a basis of disrepute into a badge of honour and, indeed, a source of pride.

Put simply, for Palestinians, the prisoner issue is only a microcosm of life under occupation, where many simply substitute a larger cell for a smaller one. Until they are all freed, there will likely be no dramatic changes inside the prison walls.