Fattouh calls for urgent international intervention to protect Marwan Barghouti and the Palestinian prisoners – Algerian Dialogue

On Thursday, the head of the Palestinian National Council, Rawhi Fattouh, called on the international community and its human rights institutions, led by the Human Rights Council and the International Committee of the Red Cross, to intervene urgently to protect the prisoner Marwan Barghouti and all Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons, in light of what he described as “a serious deterioration in their health and living conditions.”

Fattouh said in a press statement that Palestinian prisoners “are subjected to systematic torture methods that amount to slow killing,” considering that what is happening against them represents “a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions.”

He warned that “the brutal attacks against Marwan Barghouti, including beatings and solitary confinement that caused his broken ribs and loss of consciousness, represent a slow assassination,” calling for immediate international action to stop what he described as “systematic crimes inside Israeli prisons.”

Fattouh stressed that the Israeli right-wing government, especially the extremist ministers led by Itamar Ben Gvir, bears full responsibility for the lives of the prisoners, noting that the policies practiced aim to “break the will of the detainees and weaken the Palestinian national movement.”

This call comes at a time when the cities of the West Bank are witnessing a new field escalation, represented by raids and arrest campaigns carried out by the occupation army during the past hours.

In the city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, the occupation forces arrested five young men, after besieging a house in the eastern neighborhood and shooting at it, according to local sources. Another young man from the Al-Kharouba neighborhood was also arrested during separate raids.

In the village of Kafr Qaddum, east of Qalqilya, Israeli forces stormed several homes at dawn and arrested two brothers, before closing the entrances to the village with dirt barriers and turning some homes into temporary military points. The head of the village council, Muwafaq Obaid, stated that military bulldozers closed side roads and impeded the movement of residents.

In the same context, local sources reported that settlers damaged agricultural equipment and vehicles of Palestinians in the vicinity of the village, coinciding with the olive harvest season, in repeated attacks in recent weeks.

For months, the West Bank has witnessed an escalation in the pace of Israeli incursions and arrests, amid increasing political and humanitarian tension due to the repercussions of the recent war on the Gaza Strip.