Palestinian Prisoner’s Case Tests Israeli Force-Feeding Law
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Version 0 of 1. ASHKELON, Israel — The first Palestinian prisoner who could be forced to stay alive under a new Israeli law lies shackled to a hospital bed, vomiting bile and blood after 57 days of drinking only water to protest his indefinite incarceration without charges. Mohammad Allan, the prisoner, is being held at the Barzilai Medical Center in this southern Israeli city as officials search for a doctor willing to start the process to force-feed him to keep him alive. His mother, who was smuggled into Israel from Ainabus in the northern West Bank, sits outside the hospital praying for her son’s survival — and for God to smite the hands of any doctor who might carry out the new law and allow the force-feeding of her son. “May their hands be cut, may their hands be cut,” said his mother, Mazouza Odeh, 65, swaying with grief and exhaustion and raising her hands in supplication. If Mr. Allan, a 31-year-old lawyer who began his hunger strike on June 16, becomes the first prisoner force-fed under the law, which has already drawn international condemnation, it could catapult a growing international movement to boycott Israeli medical institutions over their treatment of Palestinians. It might also touch off more violence between Israelis and Palestinians in a summer already marked by deadly attacks. But if Mr. Allan does not survive his hunger strike — the International Committee of the Red Cross warned on Friday that his life was at immediate risk — his death could also set off more violence. The law passed on July 30 allows for the force-feeding of prisoners in extreme circumstances. But Israel’s medical association, which has described the move as torture, is challenging it in court. “It has to be a doctor who starts the trigger of law,” said Yoel Hadar, chief legal adviser of the Ministry of Public Security, which backed the bill. “In the meantime, we haven’t found that doctor.” Mr. Allan was taken to the hospital in Ashkelon on Monday, after doctors at the Soroka Medical Center in the nearby city of Beersheba, where he was held for two weeks, refused to conduct any forcible medical tests on him. His condition has steadily deteriorated, his lawyers and his mother said. On Tuesday, an ethics committee at Barzilai was to consider whether they would allow a forcible examination of Mr. Allan, who has refused any medical checks. If the committee allows an examination against his will, it must still find a doctor willing to conduct it. “The doctors said in Soroka, quite clearly, ‘We are not going to force-feed him,’ ” said Orna Lin, a lawyer for the Israeli Medical Association. “They think maybe the doctors in Barzilai will act differently.” Mr. Allan is a member of the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad, and he was arrested in November on suspicion of being involved in militant activity, but nothing more is known about his case, said Jamil Khatib, one of his lawyers. Mr. Allan was imprisoned in 2006 for his membership and activities in the militant group. He was released in 2008 and then detained again for over 40 days before being released without charge, Mr. Khatib said. Mr. Allan’s initial detention from November was renewed for another six months in May, prompting him to begin his hunger strike, according to his mother. “My son went on a hunger strike because of the fire in his heart,” Ms. Odeh said, adding that her son wanted to be charged, to be released or to die. One of Mr. Allan’s lawyers, Jawad Bulos, told the Palestinian news media that Mr. Allan was unable to stand without assistance. His vision is fading, the official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported. Under the new law, a doctor may forcibly feed a hunger-striking prisoner if the Israel Prisons Authority petitions a district court to do so and provides a medical report showing the prisoner is in grave condition. The law requires a doctor to conduct the initial medical examination. Doctors cannot be compelled into the process. The Ministry of Public Security has said the law is a humane move to prevent prisoners from harming themselves. The law also appears aimed at preventing Palestinian inmates from trying to win better conditions or their release from “administrative detention,” which enables the Israeli authorities to hold prisoners for six months at a time, sometimes renewing the detention for years. In such cases, security officials typically present evidence only to judges, not to detainees or their lawyers. Israeli security officials say they cannot make charges public because doing so will expose their intelligence-gathering systems. Medical officials say that to perform force-feeding, they must restrain the detainee, often for hours. They must forcibly insert a tube, which can cause bleeding or, if the prisoner is moving, pierce the lungs. It can cause grave damage or death, Israeli Medical Association officials have warned. Two Palestinian hunger strikers died in 1980 after they were force-fed, and the procedure has been used only rarely since. In Mr. Allan’s case, even as it remained unclear whether the Israeli authorities would find a compliant doctor, there were other barriers: Mr. Khatib, the lawyer, and the Palestinian legal rights group Adalah said they would immediately appeal any court decision for the prisoner to be force-fed. The Israeli Medical Association is also challenging the law in the Israeli Supreme Court. Mr. Hadar, of the Ministry of Public Security, said Mr. Allan represented a test case. “We have to learn from this case and see how we will apply the law next time,” he said. The law was “measured, maybe it is too measured,” he said. “I don’t know when we will be able to apply the law.” |