Urgent: Ahmad Sa'adat transferred to isolation in Ramon prison!
August 11, 2009
http://www.freeahmadsaadat.org/
Imprisoned Palestinian national leader Ahmad Sa'adat, the General
Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was transferred
on August 11, 2009 to Ramon prison in the Naqab desert from Asqelan prison,
where he had been held for a number of months. He remains in isolation; prior
to his transfer from Asqelan, he had been held since August 1 in a tiny
isolation cell of 140 cm x 240 cm after being penalized for communicating with
another prisoner in the isolation unit.
Attorney Buthaina Duqmaq, president of the Mandela Association for
prisoners' and detainees' rights, reported that this transfer is yet
another continuation of the policy of repression and isolation directed at
Sa'adat by the Israeli prison administration, aimed at undermining his
steadfastness and weakening his health and his leadership in the prisoners'
movement. Sa'adat has been moved repeatedly from prison to prison and
subject to fines, harsh conditions, isolation and solitary confinement, and
medical neglect. Further reports have indicated that he is being denied
attorney visits upon his transfer to Ramon.
Ahmad Sa'adat undertook a nine-day hunger strike in June in order to
protest the increasing use of isolation against Palestinian prisoners and the
denial of prisoners' rights, won through long and hard struggle. The
isolation unit at Ramon prison is reported to be one of the worst isolation
units in terms of conditions and repeated violations of prisoners' rights
in the Israeli prison system.
Sa'adat is serving a 30 year sentence in Israeli military prisons. He
was sentenced on December 25, 2008 after a long and illegitimate military trial
on political charges, which he boycotted. He was kidnapped by force in
a military siege on the Palestinian Authority prison in Jericho, where he
had been held since 2002 under U.S., British and PA guard.
Sa'adat is suffering from back injuries that require medical assistance
and treatment. Instead of receiving the medical care he needs, the Israeli
prison officials are refusing him access to specialists and engaging in medical
neglect and maltreatment.
The Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa'adat demands an end to this isolation and
calls upon all to protest at local Israeli embassies and consulates (the list
is available at:
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/About+the+Ministry/Diplomatic+missions/Web+Sites+of+Israeli+Missions+Abroad.htm)
and to write to the International Committee of the Red Cross and other human
rights organizations to exercise their responsibilities and act swiftly to
demand that the Israelis ensure that Ahmad Sa'adat and all Palestinian
prisoners receive needed medical care and that this punitive isolation be
ended. Email the ICRC, whose humanitarian mission includes monitoring the
conditions of prisoners, at jerusalem.jer@icrc.org, and inform them about the
urgent situation of Ahmad Sa'adat!
Ahmad Sa'adat has been repeatedly moved in an attempt to punish him for
his steadfastness and leadership and to undermine his leadership in the
prisoners' movement. Of course, these tactics have done nothing of the
sort. The Palestinian prisoners are daily on the front lines, confronting
Israeli oppression and crimes. Today, it is urgent that we stand with Ahmad
Sa'adat and all Palestinian prisoners against these abuses, and for freedom
for all Palestinian prisoners and for all of Palestine!
The Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa'adat
http://www.freeahmadsaadat.org
info@freeahmadsaadat.org
