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Who Is Khadar Adnan and Why Haven't We Heard More
About Him?
By mickielynn on 2012-03-01 19:45:05
[caption id="attachment_5196" align="aligncenter" width="541"]
™
_ d Poster of Khadhar Adnan and
Ghandi[/caption] During the past several months many of us have been working to get Israel to free political prisoner
Khadar Adnan from a very nasty form of imprisonment, torture and humiliation that Israel practices against Palestinians. It's
called “administrative detention." Under this draconian system any Palestinian can be picked up and detained without
charge and without any way to find out what the "secret evidence" against her/him might be. There is a finite period of time
for this harsh imprisonment but it can be repeated over and over again, for years, or for a lifetime. There is no legal recourse
and no appeal possible without knowing the basis for the detention. There is one way to fight this injustice but it's dangerous
to the person who practices it. It's a form of non-violent resistance that has been used before by political prisoners in many
situations and many nations, including the US. What it is is a hunger strike with conditions attached. In this case Khadar
Adnan's hunger strike was to the death if necessary. He had been detained one time too many and he was also striking for
the more than 300 other Palestinians currently imprisoned under the same conditions. On February 21st, after 66 days of
hunger striking and on the verge of death, Khadar reached an arrangement with the Israeli government that they would
release him and not extend his detention. However they didn't give much as they said they would continue to detain him
until his period of detention was up in April. At least this very courageous Palestinian man is still alive, which is a good
thing but there are about 307 other prisoners, some of whom have been detained for up to 5 years in this way. Some press
reports have called him The Bobby Sands of Palestine. The difference is that Bobby Sands died for his convictions while
Khadar Adnan, who is in his 40's with a pregnant wife and two young daughters is still living. Here's part of what Richard
Falk, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights, had to say in an_al Jazeera article after the hunger
strike ended:
Keeping Mr Adnan alive was also seen by Israelis as a means to avoid a wider scrutiny of the institution and
practice of administrative detention as it has been used by the Israeli military "justice" system. The
announcement of the arrangement was made an hour before an emergency session of the Israeli Supreme Court
was scheduled to hear Mr Adnan's petition for release. This highest judicial body in Israel has in the past
supported the military position in such instances. Here there was worry that the extremities of this case could
produce an adverse result and even a repudiation of the manner in which Israeli authorities used administrative
detention. The procedure is allegedly used by Israel for security purposes. Instead, administrative detention is
seemingly used to harass and intimidate militant opponents of an oppressive occupation - an occupation that has
continued for 45 years, and is aggravated by continuously appropriating Palestinian land and water for the
benefit of settlement expansion, while disrupting and cleansing long-term Palestinian residency. [...] Mr Adnan's
prior arrests stemmed from militant peaceful demonstrations that landed him in Israeli jails eight times, and
induced him to undertake shorter hunger strikes on three previous occasions, one as recently as 2010. From
what we can tell, Mr Adnan is a committed activist who has associated himself with Islamic Jihad, but works on
a daily basis as a baker and maintains an admired strong family role and popular community presence in his
small West Bank town of Arraba. Substantively, it is crucial to support a campaign to free the other several
hundred Palestinians currently being held in administrative detention and to exert enough pressure to end
reliance on the practice altogether. Mr Adnan's brave stand will have been mostly without effect if his
compelling exposure of the cruelty and arbitrariness of Israeli reliance on administrative detention is allowed to
slip from view now that his strike is over... But perhaps the most eloquent support for Khadar Adnan's actions
came from his wife, Randa Musa in a_Guardian article titled My Husband, Khadar Adnan, has shed a light on
Israel's disregard for human rights. It's a wonderfully descriptive article and reveals the courage of not only
Khadaar but his loving wife as well. If you take the time to read it you'll learn a lot about their lives and the
lives of others living in the occupied West Bank.
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="576"]
Khader Adnan
dying 2 live hunger strike against
ISRAELI INJUSTICE
~~
1 CO a
—LERCion re Ppa 4 j
| RACISMS
Khadar Adnan, "Dying to Live",
docjazz[/caption] Update, 3/3/12: Why did I write this article now? Well there are several reasons. First today is the initial
day of a teach-in, gathering, demonstration and other activities to shed light on how the Israeli lobbying group AIPAC
pressures Congress each year to act in Israel's interests whether they are our interests or not. Occupy AIPAC runs from
March 3rd through March 6th and precedes Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to the US and the massive
AIPAC lobbying efforts. http://www.occupyaipac.org Second, last weekend I attended a wonderful program on refugees that
featured four speakers: They were Michael Rice, a 1941 refugee from Nazi Germany, Ramzi Abu Jazar, a refugee from
the West Bank; Nevin Abutaima, a refugee from Gaza and Mare Lassouaoui — Senior Liaison Officer of United Nations
Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). There was something very inspiring about having a refugee from Nazi Germany
drawing the parallels of the current treatment of the Palestinians. Also the vibrant, intelligent, outraged but non-violent
young Palestinians gave faces and voices to those suffering internal and external displacement. Ramzi grew up in Jordan
after his family was driven from the West Bank and Nevin is a refugee who grew up in Gaza and is currently in the US on
her way to study in Paris, after being a student in Italy and in the US.
