The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the ruling Fatah movement today held the Israeli government responsible for the life of the Palestinian prisoners held in its jails as they stressed that the capture of four Palestinians who escaped last week from an Israeli jail will not dampen the struggle for liberation.
Ahmad Tamimi, member of the PLO’s Executive Committee, said in statement that the Israeli occupation authorities bear full responsibility for the life and well-being of thousands of incarcerated Palestinian freedom fighters “who are subjected to the most brutal forms of criminal abuse in its prisons.” He said the prisoners are considered by international law as “prisoners of war” and should be treated as such, explaining that it is their right to resist the occupation, which is illegitimate, and to be liberated from its prisons.
“The incarceration of thousands of prisoners is null and void as per international law, and therefore the international community and its bodies are required to shoulder their responsibilities towards the laws and conventions they have agree on and adopted, all of which condemn the occupation of the Palestinian and Arab territories and all its practices and violations of human rights, including the detentions and the inhumane conditions of detention,” said Tamimi.
He said the re-arrest of four of the six prisoners who escaped from Gilboa prison on Monday does not change the fact that in their breakout from prison, they have “shattered (Israel’s) arrogance, its measures and its security services.” Their re-arrest, added Tamimi, “will not change anything because the image of this occupation has been shattered and it will not be restored no matter what it does.”
The ruling Fatah movement, headed by President Mahmoud Abbas, also warned that the Palestinian people will not stand by and watch Israel mistreat the captured prisoners or any other prisoner, holding the Israeli government responsible for their life.
It said in a statement that the capturing the escaped prisoners, including Zakaria Zubeidi, who is member of the Fatah Revolutionary Council, “will not weaken the resolve of our prisoners, nor the determination of our great Palestinian people who are entrenched in the struggle and in confronting the Zionist colonial project for more than 100 years.”
“The re-arrest of the Fatah leader, Zubeidi, and his comrades will only increase the determination and resolve of the prisoners and our people to move forward in our struggle and our resistance of the abhorrent Israeli occupation to achieve our objectives in freedom and independence,” it added.
Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency