Ministry of detainees: Israel intends to deport a Palestinian prisoner

[ 18/11/2009 - 06:17 PM ]

GAZA, (PIC)-- The Palestinian ministry of prisoners’ affairs said Tuesday that the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) intends to exile Palestinian prisoner Hammad Abu Amra from occupied Palestine to another undetermined country. Information director of the ministry Riyadh Al-Ashqar stated that prisoner Abu Amr was kidnapped in 2003 when he was aboard a ship coming from Lebanon to visit his relatives in the Gaza Strip. Ashqar added that the IOA sentenced Abu Amr to six years in prison on allegations of smuggling weapons to Gaza and was released in 2009, but immediately after his release he was kidnapped by the Israeli intelligence at Beit Hanoun crossing when he was en route to Gaza. The official noted that the prisoner is married and has a number of children living in a refugee camp in Lebanon. He underlined that this policy violates the international law which criminalizes and prohibits, in accordance with article 49 of the fourth Geneva convention, any individual or mass forcible transfers. In another related context, newly released prisoner Sa’id Yassin, a human rights activist and the former director of the society of prisoner’s supporters, said that the incarceration conditions of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails are so difficult under the policy of abuse and harassment pursued by the Israeli prisons authority (IPA). In a press statement to the Palestinian information center (PIC), Yassin, who spent 44 months in administrative detention, affirmed that the IPA escalated lately its restrictions and arbitrary measures against prisoners in its jails. For its part, Wa’ed society for detainees said Wednesday it would give one million Jordanian dinars for the capture of an Israeli soldier in order to swap him for Palestinian prisoners. Wa’ed added that Israelis are also invited to compete for this financial reward. It highlighted that the blood, lives and money are cheap compared to the freedom of Palestinian prisoners.