Legal expert says Israeli wardens torture Palestinian inmates

Wardens at the Israeli prison of Ofer in the occupied West Bank have tortured several Palestinian inmates on hunger strike, says a legal expert.

Ibrahim al-Araj, a Palestinian lawyer in the West Bank city of Ramallah who has visited Ofer, voiced concern about the situation of Palestinian prisoners at the Israeli detention facility.

The prison authorities transfer those Palestinian inmates who are refusing food to solitary confinement, Araj stated.

The United Nations and Palestinian rights groups have censured the Tel Aviv regime over the plight of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.

On February 23, Arafat Jaradat, a Palestinian who had been arrested on February 18 on suspicion of involvement in hurling stones at Israeli troopers, died in Israel’s Magiddo prison. The Tel Aviv regime claims that Jaradat died of cardiac arrest, but Palestinians deny the claim.

On February 27, the United Nations Human Rights Council called for an investigation into Jaradat’s death.

The Palestinian Authority’s Minister for Prisoners’ Affairs Issa Qaraqea revealed on February 24 that the 30-year-old Palestinian had been tortured before he died in custody.

More than 4,500 Palestinian prisoners are held in Israeli prisons, many of them without charge or trial. Four prisoners — Ayman Sharawneh, Samer al-Issawi, Jaafar Ezzedine, and Tareq Qaa’dan — have been on hunger strike for months.