From jail to jail: a mother from Balata

Palestine Monitor

24 March 2009

Omm Ahmad Khadeash is a mother and grandmother who has spent most of her life living in Balata Refugee Camp, near Nablus in the West Bank. She is around 70 years old and has seen everything from the Nakba in 1948 to the brutality of the second Intifada.

Omm Ahmad Khadeash

Pictures: Palestine Monitor

Omm Ahmad was born in a village called Ejzem, near Haifa. Her village was expelled and destroyed by the Israeli military in 1948. Her family fled to Huwarra, near Nablus, and then moved to the Balata Refugee Camp when it was created in the 1950’s.

Balata Refugee Camp is known for being very political, the heart of the resistance. Many Fatah resistance leaders in the Intifada came from the camp. For this reason, the Israeli military has been especially hard on the people of Balata. Imposing curfews, conducting nightly raids of the camp in which they break down doors to the houses and destroy things inside, beat people—men and women, arrest, and sometimes kill people for being active in the resistance.

Omm Ahmad married at 15 and has seven sons and five daughters. Every one of her sons has been imprisoned. She has never experienced a time where all of her sons were at home together.

At the moment, she has six sons out of prison. One was released two months ago and another, Khaled, is still in prison—with a sentence of over 1000 years for being one of the Fatah leaders in Balata. He has four children, the youngest, Aboud, was born on the day his father was imprisoned.

Now Omm Ahmad takes care of Khaled’s wife and family—just as she has taken care of all of her sons’ families while they were imprisoned.

Omm Ahmad is well-known in Balata for intervening when the Israeli soldiers raid the camp and try to arrest anyone. She will run out and get in the middle of the fight; screaming, and saying “this is my son! This is my son!”—no matter who it is that they are trying to arrest.

She will “give the signal” to the other mothers around the camp and they will all run down and scream at the soldiers, and others will join in; screaming or throwing stones.

One time, Omm Ahmad saw Israeli soldiers running after a young girl. They caught her and started beating her.

“I began screaming and brought all of my daughters with me to where the soldiers were. Some other women heard us and joined us, screaming. We created a big chaos and the soldiers left the girl.”

Another time, Omm Ahmad saw soldiers running after a teenage boy who was carrying a flag. When he ran past her house she grabbed him and took him inside. When the soldiers came to the door she blocked them from getting in, and started screaming. Soon, other women started screaming and people began throwing stones.

She had a real fight with the soldiers and even took a gun from one of them. But because there was so much chaos around them from the screaming women and kids throwing stones, the soldiers decided it wasn’t worth it and left.

During the second Intifada, when the Israeli soldiers would impose a curfew on the camp for being active in the resistance, Omm Ahmad would ignore the curfew and take food and other supplies around to all her sons and daughters and their families.

“It was dangerous, but I did not care”, said Omm Ahmad.

Omm Ahmad has spent most of her life traveling from one prison to another visiting her sons.

“I have never had all of my sons at home at the same time.”

Her only son in prison now, Khaled, has a sentence of over 1000 years. His only chance to be released from prison is if the prisoner exchange between Hamas and Israel is successful. Hamas, who is holding the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, is trying to reach an agreement with Israel. In exchange for releasing Shalit, Hamas is asking Israel to release 450 Palestinian political prisoners—the prisoners who have consecutive life sentences—and Khaled is on that list.

Omm Ahmad was only recently given permission to visit Khaled; once a month—before that she was not allowed to visit because she is known as a “trouble-maker” by the soldiers. Khaled’s wife is only allowed to see her husband once or twice a year.

Visiting her sons in prison is like a “trip to hell”. Khaled’s prison is in southern Israel, on the border with Egypt. So when Omm Ahmad makes the trip to visit her son, she must get up before 3am and go to the special bus station in Nablus that has buses specifically for taking family members to different prisons.

The visitors must go through many checkpoints, getting rigorously searched at each one. Another humiliating process they must go through before they can visit their family members is being stripped naked.

The trip is exhausting, humiliating and takes an entire day. After all of this, Omm Ahmad is allowed to see her son for less than an hour.

Recently, Omm Ahmad and all of the families of the prisoners on the exchange list received more bad news. The talks between Hamas and the Israeli government failed, once again.

Hamas requires that all of the prisoners are released to the West Bank or to Gaza. But Israel has rejected some of the prisoners on the list and has also said that the only way they will release the remaining prisoners is by deporting them to other Arab countries. Omm Ahmad is worried that Khaled may not be released while she is alive.

“They took our sons. They took our land. They stole it from us…they have this belief that this is their land and we should not be here.”

Omm Ahmad and some of her grandchildren. Some have grown without never seeing their father

Picture: Palestine Monitor

These days, Omm Ahmad does not intervene when the soldiers come to the camp. She says that the soldiers do not care whether they beat a child or an old woman anymore. There is nothing she can do to help, and she said she is losing faith that things will change.

“We have tried everything. We tried the non violence in the 1st Intifada—just throwing stones. In the 2nd Intifada we tried violence, with the guns. It was very brutal. Now we have tried the negotiations—the peace process. Israel does not respond to anything. Why must the Palestinians respect the agreements, but not Israel? We have tried everything and each time we make a little progress but in the end we are always back at zero.”

And every time the Palestinians actively form a resistance, peaceful or violent, they always end up losing something in the end. More Palestinians are expelled, more settlements, and the wall are built.

“It’s too much”, says Omm Ahmad. “The Palestinians are arguing with each other over power! For what? For a chair? For a state that actually does not exist? We are in a very difficult situation.”

“Release the prisoners, let our sons come home! Take Palestine, we don’t want it anymore. We just want to live our lives—this is not life”, says Omm Ahmad. “At the end it’s really not worth it. I’m tired; I’ve spent most of my life going from jail to jail. There was never a time when all of my sons were at home together. It’s too much!”

As Omm Ahmad tells her story, she also makes sure to explain that this is not just her story. This is the story of many other mothers in Palestine. Boys are imprisoned for consecutive life sentences. Their parents die, waiting for their children to be released from jail.

In the end, it sounds like Omm Ahmad has lost hope for a solution to her problem, or for Palestine. But she says, “The hope remains, it is always there, like our faith in God. But I am a human being, a woman, a mother. I have a right to feel this way. I have to take care of my grandchildren and the wives of my sons while they are in prison. It’s too much.”

The Israeli forces are targeting Palestinian women researchers of Prisoners files

Report by Iqbal Tamimi
31/3/2009

The Israeli occupation forces arrested early this morning 31 March 2009 a researcher at the Centre of Studies of Prisoners. The arrested researcher is Rajaa Algul (39) is in charge of the file of Palestinian women prisoners who happens to be one of the freed ex prisoners at Israeli jails. Rajaa suffers a heart problem and her colleagues at the Centre are holding the Israeli authorities full responsibility should her health deteriorate.
Rajaa was arrested after the soldiers surrounded her home and her father’s home and her father in law’s house in the city of Jenin where they live in a refugee camp; the force was accompanied by the Israeli intelligence personnel’s.

Israeli forces also seized a number of computers from an Internet cafe that belongs to Rajaa’s brother after raiding the cafe in the camp, in addition to seizing her own personal computer and the four cellular phones belonging to the family.

The ex prisoner Rajaa AlGhoul suffer from a problem in the arteries, and has been imprisoned in the Israeli occupation jails for four years before.

The Director of the Centre for Studies of prisoners Rrf’at Hamduna is holding Israeli authorities full responsibility for her life, especially that Al-Ghoul because of the difficult conditions and ill-treatment experienced by Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails which puts their lives at risk.

Hamduna called upon the international institutions and international bodies to put pressure on the Israeli government to stop the violations of human rights and its illegal practices against the Palestinian prisoners.

The Centre for Studies of prisoners sees that the arrest of Rajaa is a flagrant violation of human rights and international conventions, and condemned the occupation forces’ targeting human rights figures especially that they have already arrested a week ago, the freed prisoner Siham Alheeh from the city of Hebron who is also working as a prisoners’ researcher.
The Centre pleas to the media to raise the matter about targeting and arresting human rights activists and researchers, and requests of lawyers and, institutions, associations and all who are interested in human rights to support them.

downgrading the incarceration conditions of Hamas prisoners

31/03/2009 HaMoked's position paper regarding the proposal being drafted by a ministerial committee for downgrading the incarceration conditions of Hamas prisoners held in Israel, as a means of exerting political pressure to advance the cause of Gilad Shalit: the proposal contradicts international and Israeli law, and is therefore inherently illegitimate On 18 March 2009, Justice Minister Daniel Friedman – who is heading a special ministerial committee tasked with drafting recommendations for downgrading the incarceration conditions of prisoners affiliated with Hamas who are held in Israel – announced that in order "to match [these prisoners'] incarceration conditions to those of Gilad Shalit", prisoners who are associated with Hamas and are being held in Israel will be denied the right to family visits, as well as other rights. The committee was convened in accordance with a government decision, as a response to the failure of negotiations for a prisoner exchange deal between Israel and Hamas. Due to its concern that the committee may accept the Minister's proposal, HaMoked is publishing a legal position paper which rejects the proposal. The position paper proves that the proposal, in violating Hamas prisoners’ rights to family visits, discriminating between them and prisoners affiliated with other organizations, collectively punishing them and turning them into bargaining chips, is radical, unreasonable and contradicts Israel's obligations under international humanitarian law and Israeli law. The position paper, which is backed by citations from Israeli and international legal sources, proves, inter alia, that violating these prisoners’ right to visits constitutes a grave infringement on the basic right to family life, both of the prisoner and of his family, as established in the Fourth Geneva Convention and other international conventions, to which Israel is party. The position paper also cautions against the improper discrimination of these prisoners as well as against the imposition of a collective punishment based only on their political affiliation, and emphasizes that this is an inappropriate punitive measure which contradicts Israeli law and international humanitarian law. Furthermore, the position paper states that Israel's obligation, under the Geneva Conventions, to guarantee the rights of prisoners, is not subject to the principle of reciprocity. Namely, the violation of the Convention's provisions by one party does not obviate the other party's obligations. Violating prisoners' rights in order to exert political pressure is unacceptable in a democratic regime and strictly prohibited. To view the position paper dated 29 March 2009

Prohibiting former prisoners from visiting prison facilities

30/03/2009

The HCJ ordered the deletion of a petition submitted by HaMoked and ACRI, which sought the cancellation of a sweeping regulation prohibiting former prisoners from visiting prison facilities, unless they receive approval from the IPS Commissioner: The deletion came after the IPS admitted, before the Court, that the wording of the regulation was indeed overly broad, and made certain changes to the Prisons Ordinance

On 19 June 2006, HaMoked and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel submitted a petition against Regulation 30(A) of the Prisons Regulations, 5738-1978, which establishes that a former prisoner may not visit a prison facility without the approval of the Commissioner of the Israel Prison Service (IPS). The regulation imputes "presumed dangerousness" to all former prisoners, regardless of whether a specific suspicion that a former prisoner's visit to jail would harm public peace or prison security has been proven or not. In the petition, the organizations claimed that by implementing a broad and sweeping prohibition, which applies to every person previously held in IPS custody, the regulation fails to distinguish between those who served sentences for serious offences and those who were jailed for minor ones, as well as between convicts and individuals who were found innocent, or released without charge. The regulation also automatically applies to persons who served a sentence of community service. The petitioners claimed, inter alia, that the regulation is arbitrary, harms a person's right to dignity and circumvents the Criminal Register and Rehabilitation Law. This Law establishes that, as a rule, a criminal conviction which is invalid by virtue of the statute of limitations must not be used. The petition also claimed that the regulation disproportionately violates the basic rights of prisoners incarcerated in IPS facilities, who are entitled to receive visits by their loved ones.

At the conclusion of the hearing, which was held on 12 March 2009, the Court ordered the deletion of the petition, citing several of the changes which the IPS made to the Prisons Ordinance - changes which addressed the issue of former inmates' visits to prison facilities, such as: responding to former inmates' requests to visit prison facilities within 14 days; the State’s undertaking to ensure that former prisoners whose convictions had been deleted would no longer be considered former prisoners; the State’s undertaking to remove from the category of former prisoners anyone previously arrested and held for investigation only, without being charged six months after his release; the State's undertaking that anyone who was remanded in custody but not charged, would be required to submit requests in order to visit a prison, for a limited period of five years.

Report: 101 Hebronites taken by Israeli troops during March; 361 since Jan 1

Date: 03 / 04 / 2009 Time: 14:21

[Ma'anImages]

Hebron – Ma’an – One-hundred and one Hebronites were taken by Israeli troops from their homes, shops and public streets during the month of March, the Palestinian Prisoners society said Friday.

In its monthly report the society noted that since the start of 2009, at least 361 individuals from Hebron were taken by Israeli troops. In February there were 91 detentions.

Among those arrested this month, according to Head of the prisoners’ society Amjad An-Najjar were:
Former prisoner Seham Al-Hayh, 31
11 hospital patients
4 children
17 students

An additional 12 from Hebron were taken from custody where they were being held without charges and put into administrative detention.

“The Israeli army committed many violations against the detainees and their families including,” An-Najjar said. Among other crimes he said, the “attacked detainees with rifle butts, detonated explosive devices in their homes, confined family members to one room while interrogating the detainee, stole money during detention campaigns, took personal documents and stole computers and mobile phones.”

He demanded human rights organizations and the International community intervene to protect residents of the West Bank’s largest city from the illegal actions of the soldiers.

Newsflashes about Palestinian prisoners

from PNN 3/4/2009

Prisoners Society: poor conditions and harsh treatment in Israeli Shatta Prison

Palestinian Center for Defense of Prisoners of War: occupation misled world and repudiatiates obligations regarding release of veteran prisoners

MP Mona Mansour: occupation measures against political prisoners will not affect determination

She died waitng for him to come back

The Nafha Prison

She died waiting for him to come back

by Natalie Abou Shakra

posted on Moments of Gaza on the 25th of March

Yesterday I went to the funeral of Umm Gazi the mother of a 51 year old political prisoner in the Nafha prison who has been imprionsed since the age of 23. Umm Gazi has not seen her son for 25 years... the last time he called was two weeks ago for three minutes, his sister told me.

Umm Gazi had joined us in the protest at the Ministry of Palestinian Political Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners' Affairs on Sunday to join tens of mothers who could make it to the protest in Gaza city. She hoped, that by attending, her son would see her on television...

On her way back home, as she laid her head on her friend's shoulder, who is also a mother whose son is imprisoned, she died... without a sound, in a dream of his return... how many parents, mothers and fathers, have fallen to such a reality?

Umm Gazi, in the eyes of many stands as a symbol of endurance, steadfastness and resistence...

We do not know if Gazi was informed... the usual procedure is to complete a form that the Red Cross would deliver to the prison's administration to deliver to Gazi... what a horrid way to recieve such a notification... from the hands of the murderer, I hear of my mother's death...

Boycott Apartheid Israel

Natalie

PS: As part of solidarity and the BDS movement, at the end of your emails, please place "Boycott Apartheid Israel" as signature... let us join hand in hand, voice with voice, word by word in resistance to injustice

Released legislator: “Abducting legislators is a crime Israel must be held accountable for”

Friday April 03, 2009 01:00 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC News

Fathi Al Qar’awi, a Hamas legislator who was recently released from an Israeli prison, described the Israeli abduction of Palestinian legislators as a war crime, and added that the legislators and all elected officials must be released.

Fathi Qar'awi

He said that all detained legislators are closely following the internal talks held in under Egyptian mediation in Cairo, and that they all believe that unity and reconciliation is the only way to maintain the Palestinian rights and steadfastness.

Qar’awi said that the detained legislators, and all detainees, regardless of their political affiliation are closely following the news on internal talks and that the detainees support the talks and support unity among all factions.

In an interview with the Palestinian Center for Defending the Detainees, Qar’awi said shortly after he was released, that the detainees are appealing the negotiators not to bring despair to the hearts and minds of their people, and to end the internal divisions.

He also said that the detainees are appealing the Arab and Islamic Nations to act for the release of all detainees imprisoned by Israel, and added that abducting legislators and elected officials violates the international law and the basic principles of human rights.

Qar’awi stated that the detainees are in solidarity with each other and with their people, and that while the Palestinian Prisoners Day approaches (April 17) there are dozens of detainees in solitary confinement, some of them spent years in solitary, and hundreds are under interrogation and torture, in addition to hundreds of detainees who are imprisoned under administrative detention orders without charges or trial.

“We must take off to the streets, we must protest, we must bring international attention to the issue of the detainees, imprisoned by Israel in violation to the international law”, he said, “there are subjected to daily violations, abuse and attacks”.

Qar’awi is from Nour Shams refugee camp, near Tulkarem, he was imprisoned by Israel several times between the years 1990 – 2002. In 1996 he was detained by the Palestinian Authority.

He was also one of a number of Hamas officials deported by Israel to Marj Al Zohour in southern Lebanon.

On December 17, 1992, Israel deported 416 Palestinians, members of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, to Marj AL Zohour. The deported Palestinians camped in Marj Al Zohour and rejected to go to Lebanon until Israel was obliged to allow them back into the country.

Studies center: IOA adds two more Palestinian prisoners to the list of deportees

[ 02/04/2009 - 08:01 AM ]

JENIN, (PIC)-- The Israeli occupation authority has informed two Palestinian brothers detained in its jails of the decision to deport them to Jordan after concluding their sentences, the prisoners studies center said on Wednesday. It added in a statement that the two brothers, Taleb and Omar Khaled Bani Odeh, had obtained official permits allowing them to stay in the Palestinian territories but the IOA threatened to confiscate those permits and to keep them in custody if they refused the deportation orders. The two prisoners hoped that the PA, concerned ministries and legal parties would pressure the IOA to allow their return to their homes in Jenin, the center said. It pointed out that the IOA had already informed six Palestinian prisoners with their inclusion on the deportation list some of whom had already completed their sentences. The IOA could not find any Arab or European country ready to host those prisoners, the center elaborated. Ra'fat Hamdona, the director of the center, said that the eight prisoners refuse their deportation orders.

Israel releases Hamas-affiliated PLC member

Date: 02 / 04 / 2009 Time: 22:01

[Ma'anImages]

Tulakarem – Ma’an – Israeli authorities released a Hamas-affiliated member of the Palestinian Legislative Council on Thursday after three and a half years behind bars.

Fathi Al-Qar’awi was being held in the Negev dentition center.

The Al-Qar’awi family said they are preparing to receive him in his house in Nur Shams refugee camp, east of the West Bank city of Tulkarem, where he is expected to arrive via Hebron.

Al-Qar’awi won legislative elections while he was detained in an Israeli; he was arrested on 25 September 2005 and released only to be detained again in 2006.

The arrest was viewed by many as a reprisal operation following the capture of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip during the summer of 2006.

Palestinian prisoners to take escalatory moves in protest at Israeli measures

[ 01/04/2009 - 02:37 PM ]

ABU DHABI, (PIC)-- The UAE Al-Khaleej newspaper quoted Palestinian MP Khaleda Jarrar as saying that the Palestinian prisoners intend to take escalatory moves inside Israeli jails including a general hunger strike in protest at the restrictive measures which the last Israeli government implemented against them. Jarrar, who herself was a prisoner in Israeli jails, added that there is no doubt that all the prisoners will be united in the face of the Israeli arbitrary measures and will not yield to attempts to tighten the incarceration conditions inside jails. In the same context, the Dhameer foundation for human rights called for pooling international legal efforts to oblige Israel not to implement its plans to privatize its prisons, asserting that such a step contravenes the rules of international humanitarian law. The foundation added that the act of privatizing jails means that the prisoners will be deprived from many services and the prison administrations will reap profits from them which also will lead to the escalation of arrests and additional financial burdens on the prisoners' families and thus the prisons will turn into commercial markets. The foundation also charged that Israel, through this dangerous precedent, tries to evade its legal and moral obligations towards the Palestinian prisoners. The last Israeli government headed by Ehud Olmert had approved in its last meeting a package of penal measures against Palestinian prisoners especially those affiliated with Hamas.

Israeli prison dentist blinds Palestinian; family calls for his release

Date: 01 / 04 / 2009 Time: 19:29

[Ma'anImages]

Jenin - Ma'an - The family of 29-year-old Mohamad Tawfiq Ghawadreh, who lost his sight after being infected with an un-sanitized needle while in an Israeli prison, is concerned about Mohammed’s deteriorating condition and is calling for Abbas to intervene.

Mohammed was suffering from tooth aches and oral-abscesses and was treated by a prison dentist, who injected him with an infected syringe. The virus he was infected with travelled to his eyes and left him blind in the left eye.

There is currently a concern that the infection will travel to his right eye as well, leaving him totally blind.

The family noted that prison officials noticed his degrading condition and transferred him to the Ar-Ramleh Hospital but his health has not improved. The family has been prevented from visiting Mohammed since he was removed to hospital. They have sent an appeal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to pressure Israel for his release.

It is worth mentioning that Mohammad was detained in the 2004 after being tracked for several years accused of affiliation to Al-Aqsa brigades and he has three brothers and they are also detained. The first Muhammad detained for lifetime and sayel detained for 5 years and Walid detained for 12 years and he has another two brothers but they were released.

Fatah leader in Beita village sentenced to 19 years in Israeli prison

Date: 01 / 04 / 2009 Time: 15:23

[Ma'anImages] Nablus – Ma’an – Israel’s military court at Salem sentenced 35-year-old Abd Ar-Rahim Barham to 19 years in prison. Barham, from Beita village south Nablus, is a Fatah leader in the area. His family would not comment on the nature of the charges against him, but noted that he was “essentially being imprisoned for being a member of Fatah.” Barham was detained when Israeli troops raided his house in the 2006, he has been held in administrative detention for 32 months.

Farwana: “95 detainees held by Israel for more than twenty years”

Wednesday April 01, 2009 11:51 by IMEMC & Agencies

Palestinian researcher, specializing in detainees’ affairs, Abdul-Nasser Farwna, stated that in March another four have joined the list of detainees who have been imprisoned by Israeli for more than twenty years. This brings the number of detainees imprisoned for more than twenty years to 95.

Farwana added that the four detainees are Ibrahim Lutfi Taqmouq, detained since 3/3/1989; Sami Nayif Al Na’neeshy, detained since 3/5/1989, both from Nablus; Eyad Ahmad Abu Hasna, detained since 15/3/1989; and Mohammad Abdul-Rahman Zaqqout, detained since 23/3/1989, both from Gaza.

Farwana added that there are six detainees who were kidnapped by the army in March 1986. He identified them as Mohammad Abdul-Hadi Al Hosni, from Gaza; Tawfiq Ibrahim Abdullah; Mustafa Mahmoud Qar’oush, from Nablus; Ibrahim Nayif Abu Mokh; Roshdy Hamdan Abu Mokh; and Ibrahim Bayadsa.Also, detainee Mahmoud Salem Abu Khreish, from Ramallah, was kidnapped by the army twenty-two years ago.

Furthermore, Farwana stated that three detainees entered their fifteenth year in detention last week. They were identified as Abdul-Rahman Hasan Al Awawda from Hebron; Atiyya Salem Abu Mousa; and Hazim Qassem Shbeir from Khan Younis. These three were kidnapped in March 1993.

334 detainees were kidnapped before the Oslo peace deals, and before the Palestinian Authority was established.

Farwana said that the detainees are hoping to be freed in a prisoner-swap deal between the resistance and Israel under Egyptian mediation.

Ramahi: Prisoners support resistance's demands for release of Shalit

[ 01/04/2009 - 07:28 AM ]

RAMALLAH, (PIC)-- MP Dr. Mahmoud Al-Ramahi has stressed that all Palestinian prisoners were in support of the Palestinian resistance's "just demands" for the release of the Israeli captured soldier Gilad Shalit. Dr. Ramahi, who was released from Israeli jails on Tuesday evening after two and a half years in detention, said that the prisoners and detained MPs were unanimous in refusing to negotiate with the Israeli occupation authority over the exchange deal. He added that all prisoners should be released topped by those serving high sentences. The lawmaker said that the prisoners asked him to convey a message to the Palestinian people namely to achieve national unity. Dr. Ramahi, who was arrested in his home in El-Bireh city on 20/8/2006, is one of the prominent Hamas political leaders in the West Bank. The MP, who graduated from University of Rome, medicine faculty in 1987, was elected to the Palestinian legislative council in January 2006 and was chosen as the PLC secretary. Israel releases PLC secretary after nearly three years in jail Date: 01 / 04 / 2009 Time: 09:17 Mahmoud Ar-Ramahi [Ma'anImages] Gaza – Ma’an – Israel released the secretary of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), Dr Mahmoud Ar-Ramahi, after holding him for 32 months in prison on Tuesday. Israel seized Dr Ramahi and more than two dozen other Palestinian lawmakers and ministers after Palestinian fighters captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in 2006. Forty four PLC members and three ministers affiliated to Hamas are still detained in Israeli jails. In the West Bank, only six members of Hamas’ Change and Reform bloc are still free. Two Fatah lawmakers and one Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) lawmaker are also in prison in Israel. Ar-Ramahi was quoted as saying, “prisoners and jailed PLC members sent a message to the Palestinian people asking them to stick to national unity which is a necessity regardless of all obstacles.” He also revealed that Israeli authorities attempted to negotiations about a prisoner swap with Hamas leaders in prison such as PLC speaker Dr Aziz Dweik, and Sheikh Muhammad Abu Teir. However, jailed Hamas leaders refused to hold any such talks.