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A Prison Story

Yesterday marked the fifth anniversary of the abduction of Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier who has been held by Hamas without access to the Red Cross or contact with his family. This is a blatant breech of international law, which states that under no circumstances may a hostage be taken in order to force an opposing party to make concessions; this is a war crime, and all of those who commit such crimes have blood on their hands. There is also no doubt that various Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails have committed atrocities against humanity, and this post will not attempt to justify heinous crimes. There is, however, a narrative of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons that we do not hear very often (except for that awful translation job at the Abu Jihad Museum at al-Quds–I know plenty of Arabic students who would love to be your translation interns, guys…).  I have a friend who, during the second intifada, was arrested for participating in student-led leftist political activities. With the help of his narrative, I thought I’d share his experience with our seminar. This post is not meant to define the on-the-fact situation on Israeli jails; this is simply a personal narrative as it was relayed to me. Given that all narratives enhance experiences as they are perceived through an individual’s particular circumstances, I am less interested in the “Israel-does-this, Palestine-does-this” arguments rather than portraying yet another personal story in the long volume I will one day right entitled “TOO MANY NARRATIVES: GES Jerusalem ‘11”.

My friend was a student at Bethlehem University and finishing his senior year when he received a call to report to the Israeli police for questioning. As he had an exam that day, he responded that he’d come in the next morning. He reported to the police the next day, where he was questioned and ultimately arrested for his political activity on campus. My friend told me that he was not one to participate in political demonstrations; he was more interested in the theoretical concepts of socialist revolution. The concern of the Israelis, he said, was rooted in the fact that he openly supported the concept of a one-state solution. At his initial hearing, after a few days in prison, he was presented to the judge, having contracted a severe case of pneumonia. The judge recommended that he be sent to the infirmary, where he was given a few doses of Asprin and a full pack of cigarettes–a rare commodity in prison. He was then held in the Russian Compound, underground, for nine days.  Following these days, my friend was tried in front of a civilian court, without having had time to convene with his lawyer. He was sentenced to nine months in jail as what he was told was a precautionary measure–though there was no evidence presented that he was participating or planning any violent efforts, there had been previous members of his leftist organization that had gone on to become militant. The trial did, however, provide him an opportunity to display wounds he acquired from mistreatment at the hands of the Israeli prison guard. His parents, who were present at the trial, were forbidden from hugging their son before he was re-imprisoned. He was relocated to Ella prison in BeerSheeba, where he was visited twice in nine months: once by the Red Cross, once by Addameer, a prisoners’ support and human rights organization. His family is originally from Silwan but has since moved out of the Israeli municipality (my friend retains his Jerusalemite status). Because of this, they were unable to gain permits to visit their son in Israel proper.

The political situation effects both prison organization and higher education in manners which are not always obvious. This friend was originally provided with a full scholarship to study architecture–his passion–in Egypt. Then the second intifada erupted, and he was forced to stay close to home, as the university closed its doors to Palestinian students, not wanting to encourage dissenting political activity on their campus. He is now an accountant–far from his original dream, but working with an impressive international firm. He shared that the Israeli prison system is, from within, wholly socially organized by political factions: prisoners are grouped into Fatah, Hamas, and Popular Front tents, each of which have prisoner-leaders who coordinate directly with the Israeli prison security. We discussed a bit the issues of denying continuing education to prisoners. Will education be denied to all prisoners? Will it be denied to just those deemed “arch-murderers”? Are all of the prisoners dubbed as such direct participants in the killing of civilians? As we know, education has the ability to destroy preconceptions, ill-formed notions, and allow individuals to reconsider their personal and political stances, sometimes allowing those to reframe their views into more tolerant outlooks. What is the implication behind denying education to those who really need these notions challenged? Education is not a luxury, it is a right granted by international law (Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 26)–the same international law that calls for the stop of inhumane acts such as holding Shalit captive without outside contact. International law and human rights are not a game of eye-for-eye. If Israel wants to show a sign of moral superiority over Hamas, it doesn’t make sense to me to deny a fundamental right to prisoners in response to Hamas’ decision to do so. This relates back to a statement that I have heard from this formally imprisoned friend more times that I can count: in his view, restraining from violence allows those who engage in nonviolent resistance to retain their morality–killing, in his mind, cannot right the wrong that he experienced.

 

–Molly

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