Palestinian Islamic Jihad figure dies in custody

It is a death that will further inflame tensions between Israel and Palestine. Khader Adnane, a senior leader of the Palestinian Islamist movement Islamic Jihad, died on Tuesday May 2, report the Israel Prison Service, Islamic Jihad and the Palestinian Prisoners Club. He had been on a hunger strike for more than 80 days to protest his detention by Israel.

The president of the Palestinian Prisoners Club, Qaddoura Fares, told AFP that this was the first Palestinian detainee to die in detention in Israel from a hunger strike. The prisoner had started his hunger strike on February 5 and “refused to undergo medical examinations and to receive treatment”according to the Israeli Prison Service.

A symbol for the Palestinians

Khader Adnane, a native of the northern occupied West Bank, had been imprisoned numerous times by Israel and had gone on several hunger strikes, becoming a symbol for the Palestinians. The announcement of his death was followed by rocket fire from the Gaza Strip into Israel.

On Friday, his wife Randa Moussa explained to AFP that he refused “any assistance, any medical examination”. “He is in a cell where the conditions of detention are very difficult. They (Israel) refused to transfer him to a civilian hospital and to allow the visit of his lawyer”, she added. The armed organization Islamic Jihad is considered a movement “terrorist” by Israel, the United States and the European Union.