Palestine hunger strike in uncharted territory after 89 days

A rights group says Palestinian detainee Mohammed al-Qiq has now entered uncharted medical territory after 89 days of refusing food in Israeli custody, the longest such hunger strikes in decades.

Amani Dayif, a doctor at Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHR-I), said 33-year-old Qiq is in “unknown territory” medically because of the length of his fast , and that his condition is rapidly deteriorating.

“All medical literature depends on experiences from the past, and in all the experiences, there is no case of any hunger striker who has taken the Irish model, only drinking water, for this long,” she said.
The PHR-I further noted that Qiq has been on a hunger strike longer than two Palestinian detainees, which fasted for 66 and 67 days.

His protest fast also surpasses the ones by Irish Republican Army prisoners held by Britain in Northern Ireland during the 1981 protest strikes.

Ten of the Irish hunger strikers lost their lives because of extended fasts, and the longest strike lasted for only 73 days.