JERUSALEM, 25 August 2004 — Israel declared its hospitals off limits yesterday to 2,800 Palestinians on hunger strike in Israeli prisons, saying they could be treated in makeshift facilities behind bars if taken ill.
Palestinian inmates at 10 jails are refusing food to force wardens to stop strip searches, allow more frequent family visits, improve sanitation and install public telephones. They have quickly become symbols of resistance to Israeli occupation.
“I am not prepared for there to be a situation where the lives of patients and medical teams are endangered in our hospitals as a result of us having to admit these murderers,” Health Minister Danny Naveh told Army Radio.
“If a field hospital has to be set up at a Prisons Service installation, then that is what should be done.”
Public Security Minister Tzahi Hanegbi, like Naveh a member of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s right-wing Likud party, said last week he did not care if the prisoners starved to death.
Palestinian President Yasser Arafat told reporters he was calling on the International Committee of the Red Cross to intervene and “see these crimes for themselves”.
Israeli officials say the liquid-only fast, which began Aug. 15, is a ploy by prisoners to secure easier communication with militant groups at the heart of a Palestinian revolt.
About 7,000 Palestinians are held in Israeli jails. Hisham Abdel-Razek, the Palestinian minister for prisoners affairs, told Reuters: “Israel is behaving like a state above the law and Israeli ministers are acting as if they are above Israeli law.”
