The Palestinian Center for Prisoners' Studies has confirmed that the list of martyrs from the captive movement has increased during the first half of the current year to reach 237 martyrs, including 4 new prisoners who have ascended in the occupation's prisons, including a minor.

The "Palestinian Center" explained that the caravan of martyrs from the captive movement continues to rise steadily as a result of the occupation's criminal policies against prisoners, the deliberate medical negligence towards sick prisoners, and the systematic killing of prisoners through their detention in harsh conditions and the lack of medical care for them.

The Center's director, Riyad Al-Ashqar, revealed a clear increase in the number of martyrs from the captive movement during the current year, with 4 martyrs in the first half alone, compared to 5 martyrs in the entire previous year.

Al-Ashqar pointed out that the four martyrs who ascended during the past six months are as follows: The Jerusalemite teenager, Wadi' Aziz Abu Ramouz (16 years old), who was martyred in Shaare Zedek Hospital three days after his arrest, following being shot in the town of Silwan.

As for the second martyr, he is the prisoner Ahmed Badr from Hebron, who was martyred due to deliberate medical negligence after 11 years of his detention.

While the third martyr, the young man Mahmoud Jamal Hamdan (22 years old) from Aqaba Jabr Camp in Jericho, was martyred 10 hours after his arrest while wounded during the invasion of the camp on the first of March last year.

In a systematic and deliberate assassination operation, the captive sheikh Khader Adnan from Jenin ascended as a martyr after 86 days of his open hunger strike, as the occupation refused to release him exceptionally due to the seriousness of his condition in the final days, and prevented his transfer to a civilian hospital for treatment, keeping him in solitary confinement at Ramle prison clinic without any follow-up of any emergencies that might afflict him, until he ascended as a martyr, and his body is still being held.

Al-Ashqar also noted that the occupation authorities continue to hold the bodies of 11 prisoners from the captive movement to this day.

Al-Ashqar denounced the heinous policy practiced by the occupation and legalized through a special law allowing the detention of the bodies of Palestinian martyrs with the aim of revenge against them and their families and punishing them after their death.

He called on the international community and its human rights and humanitarian institutions to form an investigative committee to uncover the real reasons for the martyrdom of prisoners inside prisons and to pressure the occupation to release the detained bodies of martyrs in line with the Geneva Conventions, which obligated occupiers to hand over the bodies to their families, respect the dignity of the deceased, and consider their religious rituals.

The number of Palestinian prisoners and detainees in Israeli prisons is about 4,900 prisoners, including 34 female prisoners, according to institutions concerned with prisoners' affairs.

Palestinian prisoners live in harsh and oppressive conditions in Israeli prisons due to the violations committed by the Israeli jailers against them, and they are denied their basic rights.

Source: AL MAYADEEN