Muhammad Allan’s Suspended Detention Can Be Reversed

by Stephen Lendman

Despite Israel’s High Court suspending Allan’s detention for medical reasons as a first step toward freeing him, Israel may reimpose it if his health improves.

He’s been lawlessly imprisoned since last November - uncharged and untried because he committed no crimes. Yet Israel’s police state process permits kidnapping and indefinite detention - or rearrest any time if he’s released.

Allan remains a marked man whatever his health status. Thousands of other Palestinians endure the same fate - victims of vicious apartheid injustice.

Allan remains hospitalized at Israel’s Barzilai Medical Center in serious condition - fed intravenously after ending 65 days of agonizing hunger striking for justice, now as a patient, no longer a painfully shackled prisoner.

His ordeal left him brain damaged - whether reversible it’s too soon to know. On Friday, he filmed a video from his hospital bed thanking supporters for backing his struggle for justice.

“I thank each and every one of you who stood by our side, by the side of the family, in front of the hospital and everywhere else, to the (Arab citizen) brothers inside (Israel),” he said.

“I kiss them on the forehead and hands for taking a stand. It proves that we are one people, and no distance or border will separate us.”

“I hope we won't have to deal with more struggles and crises. I thank everyone again and God who helped me out of this crisis.”

Earlier he said through his attorney: “Administrative detention returns us to slavery, and therefore I refuse to be a slave to anyone.”

“The truth is that I currently prefer hunger as long as freedom is the goal in the absence of law in Israeli courts. So, I found myself forced to fight this battle.”

Israel lawlessly imprisons many thousands of Palestinians unjustly - criminalized for wanting the same fundamental rights as Jews, what international law mandates, Israel’s obligation as an occupying power, what it systematically denied an entire population for nearly half a century, under more repressive rule now than earlier.

Allan was earlier arrested in 2006 on bogus charges, sentenced to three years in prison. In 2011, he was kidnapped and lawlessly detained for 50 days.

Israel brutalizes Palestinian prisoners - held in gulag hell solely for political reasons. Wanting to live free is criminalized. Israel calls it “terrorism.”

Allan and other Palestinian political prisoners represent the longstanding struggle of an entire  population persecuted for not being Jewish - treated viciously by a ruthless occupying power.

Over 1,000 notable African-American figures affirmed solidarity with Palestinians by letter, stating in part:

“(W)e the undersigned Black activists, artists, scholars, writers, and political prisoners offer this letter of reaffirmed solidarity with the Palestinian struggle and commitment to the liberation of Palestine’s land and people.”

“We remain outraged at the brutality Israel unleashed on Gaza through its siege by land, sea and air, and three military offensives in six years.”

“We remain sickened by Israel’s targeting of homes, schools, UN shelters, mosques, ambulances, and hospitals. We remain heartbroken and repulsed by the number of children Israel killed in an operation it called ‘defensive.’ “

“Israel’s injustice and cruelty toward Palestinians…extends throughout the occupied territories, within Israel’s 1948 borders, and into neighboring countries.”

“The Israeli Occupation Forces continue to kill protesters - including children - conduct night raids on civilians, hold hundreds of people under indefinite detention, and demolish homes while expanding illegal Jewish-only settlements.”

“Israel’s widespread use of detention and imprisonment against Palestinians evokes the mass incarceration of Black people in the US, including the political imprisonment of our own revolutionaries.”

“Soldiers, police and courts justify lethal force against us and our children who pose no imminent threat.” Decades of Israeli brutality toward Palestinians “would be impossible without” US funding and support, they explained.

They “wholeheartedly” endorse BDS activism to continue pressuring Israel for justice. They “sen(t) a loud and clear message to Palestinians,” Israel’s government and America’s.

“(N)ow is the time for Palestinian liberation, just” like it is for millions of denied Americans.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

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