Palestinian journalist 'nearing death' in Israeli jail

posted on: Jan 12, 2016

Patrick Strickland

Al Jazeera

A Palestinian political prisoner has been taken to hospital and is in a critical condition as he continues to refuse food in protest at being imprisoned by Israel without charges, a Palestinian official has told Al Jazeera.

Muhammad al-Qeq, a 33-year-old journalist from the occupied West Bank village of Dura, launched his fast on November 24 in protest against his administrative detention, a practice in which Israel imprisons Palestinians on “secret evidence” and without trial or charges.

Israel suspends detention of Palestinian hunger
“He hasn’t eaten in 49 days and his health is very bad now,” Issa Qaraqe, head of the Palestinian Authority’s prisoner committee, told Al Jazeera, adding that Qeq had been transferred to Afula hospital in northern Israel.

“He has many serious health issues and we fear he is nearing death,” Qaraqe said, adding that the prisoner has lost 22kg.

“We are worried that Israeli prison authorities will force-feed him,” he said, referring to the Israeli government’s legalisation of July 2015 that allows the force-feeding of prisoners who refuse to eat.

Explaining that Qeq temporarily slipped into a coma over the weekend, Qaraqe said that the Palestinian government was calling on international organisations and human rights groups to intervene on behalf of the prisoner and “help save his life”.

The Palestinian Centre for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA), a press rights group, called in a statement published earlier this week for Israel to release Qeq .

In addition to Qeq, at least two other Palestinian political prisoners are on hunger strike behind Israeli bars, Qaraqe said.

Source: www.aljazeera.com