This week, we’re sharing two segments.
Addameer on Palestinian Prisoners
First up, we spoke with Tala Nasser of the Palestinian prisoner human rights group, Al-Addameer which has offices in Jerusalem or Al-Quds, as well as in Ramallah. We speak about the report they released on Palestinian Prisoners day, April 17th, on the conditions of Palestinian prisoners, particularly since October 7th, 2023 including in Gaza since the invasion. More info on the group and their findings can be found at addameer.org
A-Radio Berlin on new TTRPG “Oceania 2084”
Then, we’ll hear a segment by our comrades at A-Radio Berlin speaking with Johan Eriksson, an anarchist game designer has recently published such an RPG called “Oceania 2084“, based on George Orwell’s novel “1984”. You can find more of about the game including a free austere pdf of the gameplay at jocher-symbolic-systems.itch.io , and you can hear more audios from A-Radio Berlin at aradio-berlin.org .
Sean Swain’s 2024 Presidential Run
For the sake of anyone in the office of Attorney General of Ohio if they’re listening: this segment is political satire. We feel it’s necessary to make this disclaimer as they referenced a spoof press conference for Sean as governor in exile of Ohio on the January 18th, 2015 radio segment in court filings to prove how dangerous Sean is, while actually just showing how stupid hierarchs are.
Midweek Release: Yaffa As
In case you missed mid-week release of our interview with Yaffa As, a queer and trans Palestinian poet, author, publisher and activist living in the diaspora about two recent collections they published as well as mutual aid and fundraising to get queer Palestinians out of range of Israeli genocide.
. … . ..
Featured Track:
- Ya Taali’een ‘ala el-Jabal (Oh you, climbing up the mountain) by Rim Banna from The Dream
Transcription
Tala Nasser: So my name is Tala Nasser, I’m a human rights lawyer, a Palestinian human rights lawyer. I’m based in Ramallah in the West Bank. I work with Addameer. I’ve been working with Palestinian political prisoners for like six years. Addameer is a Palestinian NGO that works with Palestinian political prisoners. We actually provide free legal aid to Palestinians. We also monitor and document the violations committed against Palestinian political prisoners. And we raise awareness regarding this important issue. And we then advocate locally and internationally for the prisoners rights.
TFSR: Thank you for being here. To mark Palestinian Prisoners Day on April 17, your organization released a fact sheet about prisoners and Palestine, particularly since the attacks of October 7, 2023 and the changes that have occurred. Could you talk a bit about what prison conditions and courts were like before October 7, 2023 for Palestinians?
TN: Yeah, so like the situation in prisons, of course, as events escalated, it has become much worse. That doesn’t mean that it wasn’t like this before October 7. So, Palestinian prisoners have suffered a lot before October 7. They were subjected to different acts of torture and ill-treatment, they were subjected to medical negligence, in addition to isolation and solitary confinement, and different policies imposed against political prisoners.
But the thing is that after October 7, the situation has worsened so much that the Israeli Prison Service has closed and isolated the prisoners from each other. They prevented prisoners from talking to each other; they closed the cells of the prisoners inside every prison. They also cut off the electricity in all of the prison at the like the next day day of October 7. Also, the Israeli occupation forces have cut the water supply, they reduced the water supply to only one hour per day. And this means that the prisoners can only drink clean water, not clean water can only drink water in this one hour. And they also drink tap water, which means it is dirty. And this led to them having medical issues in their stomach and on the skin. They had skin rash and different types of skin situation there. They also prevented the prisoners from going out to the yard to the outside yard. And this yard is a very small yard, but they used to go for this yard before for like three to four hours. And after October 7, they were completely prevented from going out in this yard. Now that now they are letting prisoners go to the yard for only one hour per day.
And regarding women prisoners, and some of men prisoners in some of the prisons, the showers are actually located in the yard, which means that they cannot shower at any time, they can only show up in this very short period of time. This one hour time. And one other important thing is that the Israelis also closed the canteen, and Palestinian prisoners used to buy their food and all their supplies from this canteen. The Prison Service does not provide the prisoners with anything, they have to buy everything from this canteen with their own money. And after October 7, they closed the canteen, and they started providing the prisoners with a too poor quality and quantity meals, very poor quality and quantity meals. And when I say poor, I mean that the prisoners have lost an average of 15 to 20 kilograms of their weight. And this is a very big number. So they also prevented prisoners from going to or to be transferred to the clinics, to prison clinics and to outside hospitals and clinics, and we have a lot of cancer patients. We have a lot of ill prisoners, and they didn’t take their medications at first two weeks. So they fled to the to them to the to the health deterioration of the of the whole situation.
And within all that, at first, the Israeli occupation forces announced that they are banning the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) from visiting any of the prisons. Until this day, so we’re talking about eight months, the ICRC is not able to visit and does not have access to any of the prisons. At the first two weeks, they banned also the lawyers from visiting the prisons. We tried and applied to two different prisons to visit the detainees there and we were completely banned. After that, they gave us permission to visit the prisons. But of course, by imposing different restrictions against our visitation, which means that, for example, if I apply for a visit today, they do not give me the permission for until the next month. And this is a long period of time. Another example is that if I apply for a visit, and then if the lawyer reaches the prison, they are really the emergency bill and say there is emergency situation here, you cannot visit. And they do this on purpose, and they did this with different lawyers and in different prison. The third example is that if the lawyer reaches the prison to visit this specific prisoner, they say, “Oh, we’re sorry, that prisoner was actually transferred to another prison.” They also did this with different prisoners, and on purpose, or they want to prevent us from documenting the torture which they committed against the prisoners because they had bruises all over their bodies, and this ban will actually prevent us from seeing these bruises and documenting it professionally. So this is the situation in general.
TFSR: So just for listeners that aren’t that don’t measure in kilograms, that weight loss that was being described, with the canteen was closed, and the poor diets ranges between like 30 and 40 pounds. And because a lot of our listeners are in the US, and that’s, that’s the measurements more that’s more popular and understood here. The access to water for one hour that you mentioned, yeah. Do the prisoners have toilets in their in their cells? Or do they just have like a hole or a bucket? Or, like, are they able to flush, refuse or, or excrement during that period of time? Or does that just sit for the day?
TN: Yes, they actually have toilets, they have a hole in the ground, and they could flush. But the thing is that they didn’t provide them with toilet paper. So for weeks they didn’t have any toilet paper. And of course, they didn’t have also the shampoo to shower and take the bath. So they don’t have these necessities. And the water is actually for drinking. So at the first month, they couldn’t shower, they couldn’t take a shower at the first two to three months. None of the prisoners could shower. And one other important thing is that at the first day after October 7, they confiscated their clothes. So they also confiscated their underwear their clothes. So they only stayed with the thing they were wearing at this day on the on the eighth of October. They stayed like this for more than four months with received clothes without being able to shower or to take a bath.
TFSR: One more question before and this might lead into the question of what the courts have been like, but my understanding is that you were doing prisoner support work before October 7, obviously, you’ve been working around prisoner issues for six years, I believe you said. Was there a massive influx of prisoners also during this time that like following the 7th and how has that impacted the conditions that people have been existing in?
TN: Yeah, I was going to speak about that in the next question. Regarding the incarceration.
TFSR: We can go into the courts as you were about to, thank you very much.
TN: Okay. So regarding the courts, Palestinian prisoners are actually tried before military courts; the Israeli occupation imposes military orders against Palestinians, that’s why we are tried before military courts. And these military courts are actually illegal, not legal. Because the first important thing is that no fair trial guarantees in these military courts, and I’ll explain now how. For example, the administrative detention, so the Israeli occupation forces use the risk of detention to incarcerate the largest possible number without any trial. N administrative detainee is presented before any court. This is the first thing. The second thing is that these courts, like the judges and the prosecutors in these courts are military. They work within the military and they wear inside these courts, they are wearing the military clothes. This is the thing also.
And regarding, for example, the interpretation: there is no effective interpretation. There’s this interpreter inside the military court, who does nothing by the way, who stays is on his phone for the whole session. The detainee is not understanding anything because the language of the court is in Hebrew. Not all Palestinians know this language. Very few of them know the Hebrew language, so the detainee does not understand anything. The session takes place, the judge is speaking, the prosecutor is speaking, the lawyer is speaking, while the detainee is just like listening to words that they do not understand. And the interpreter is playing on his phone and not doing his work in interpreting.
We talked about all these violations to the fair trial guarantee. And by the way, it’s a war crime- not having the fair trial guarantees inside any courts. This is the thing with military courts. That’s why we launched a campaign against the military courts, and we claim in this campaign that these military courts are illegal, and they are denying Palestinian prisoners fair trial guarantees, which is a war crime, and which means these military courts have to end. And also children are tried before these military courts. So the whole situation within these, this whole system of the military occupation and the military, the Israeli military corps, we have to put an end to this whole system. Because of its violations to the international law.
TFSR: Just to sort of lay out very clearly the consequences of a military court… First off, if we’re talking about the Occupied Territories, are settlers also tried when they’re arrested under military courts? Or they tried to under civilian courts?
TN: Yeah. So this is an important question: No, settlers are never tried before military courts, they are only tried before civil courts, even though they are settled in the West Bank. So they only apply military orders and they only try Palestinians before this court. So this is the thing. We here see the discrimination, like how the Israelis try Palestinians before these military courts, which lack fair trial guarantees. If they try a settler, they do that before a civil court. Here we can see that discrimination against Palestinians within this whole system
TFSR: With a military court. It doesn’t sound like the Palestinians that are brought before it, let alone have like, obviously, you already mentioned do not have translation actively available to them. But they also probably don’t have the right to challenge the conviction, or to have a lawyer present to advocate on their behalf. Yes? Is that correct?
TN: No, the have a lawyer, but like lawyers can do nothing within these military courts. Because the prosecutors present the list of charges, which usually is regarding the freedom of speech, the university and union work against students. And then it’s really hard for the lawyer to defend this because it’s not actually a crime. So, in its nature, it’s not a crime, but in military orders, it is. So it’s hard here to defend, to effectively defend, the detainee. While regarding administrative detention, there are there are no charges presented. So the lawyer has to do nothing in this session. There is a judicial review session which have administrative details inside the military court. At this session, the judge looks at the “secret file” (because they claimed there is a secret file that neither the lawyer nor the detainee can look at, or know what is inside the secret file). And they base all the imprisonment on this secret file. So the judge looks at the secret file, which the prosecutor is presenting to the judge. The lawyer here cannot know what is in the secret file. How would the lawyer defend the detainee in this case? Because no charges are presented. It’s only secret.
So yes, of course, it’s really hard to do that. It’s really hard for lawyers to be present in these military courts. And that’s why prisoners and detainees have boycotted the military courts, like two years ago detainees have boycotted these military courts, because they are actually doing nothing except for confirming the arbitrary detention of Palestinians. Judges, Israeli military judges are only confirming arbitrary detention against Palestinians. And that’s why they took the decision once or twice, like they took it more than once, let’s say, against these military courts against this arbitrary administrative detention and they boycotted this judicial review session.
TFSR: Thank you for allowing me to ask follow up questions. I really appreciate it. You mentioned children in custody and children going through these courts. Can you talk about the conditions that the children are being kept in?
TN: Yeah, so regarding children, unfortunately, they are exposed to the same exact situation as adults. The thing is that children are separated from adults inside the prison, but they can have like one adult prisoner with them in the in the same section in the prison. After October 7, they isolated this adult prisoner and they kept the children alone, with no adult with them for months. They committed every violation against children, just like the adults: they raided their cells; they brutally beat the prisoners. And that happened with many children. And you know, in November, last November, this exchange deal took place and the Israelis released 169 Palestinian children. And most of them were beaten up. Some of them were, like we saw on the camera and we saw in person, have bruises all over their bodies, some of them have no shoes when they were released. So it’s really horrible the situation in prison.
And of course, poor children as well, because they need special attention, they need special treatment. And this, of course, does not happen in Israeli prisons, and they have to face different kinds of acts of torture and ill treatment. And when we’re talking about Gaza, the situation is much more horrible, actually. Because some of them are still forcibly disappeared. We don’t know where they are, where they are holding child prisoners from the Gaza Strip. We know that the situation is really horrible because we’ve been documenting with many released prisoners regarding this issue. And we know that they are not allowed to sleep, how they are 24/7 handcuffed and blindfolded, that are they only provide them with very thin mattresses, like two centimeter mattresses to sleep on for only three hours, and then they take back the mattress. So children are subjected to all these inhuman acts and all these inhumane crimes, which is really alarming, actually.
TFSR: Yeah, that really is.
You had mentioned that prisoners who were being detained, who had cancer, who were taking medications, or maybe who had other health concerns have been denied their medications. The report that Addameer put out talked about a number of deaths that occurred in custody, particularly since October 7. I’m sure a number of these are due to the denial of medical care. Could you talk a bit more about the generalized conditions and especially for infirm or elderly or injured people?
TN: Yeah, so after October 7, just like I said, the Israeli prison service and Israeli special forces raided all of the prisons and all the cells. And they started brutally beating the prisoners, regardless of their age, regardless of their health situation, regardless of their sex, regardless of anything. And all these beatings and torture have led to the killing of 18 Palestinian political prisoners inside the prison. And this number is alarming. This number is unprecedented within this very short period of time. And most of these deaths were due to the torture and ill treatment.
And I’ll speak about this now and then move to the medical negligence which led to the killing of another one. So regarding torture and ill treatment, the Israeli occupation forces open an investigation regarding false cases of the killed Palestinian inside the prisons, and they did the autopsy examination for these five cases, and the initial autopsy reports show and confirm that: they were brutally beaten; they were tortured; they had bruises all over their bodies; they had fractures in different parts. And they were most of them were internal bleeding due to the beatings and torture. Result in their killing.
So the initial reports confirm that we’re still waiting for the investigation to to continue. But it’s important to know that we’ve been working for more than 30 years with this is what Israeli system, and we know that they always like, 99% of the complaints, or the investigation opened by the Israeli authorities end up closed claiming there is not enough evidence. So we are really afraid that this will happen because in these five cases. We are afraid that they will also close the investigation claiming there is no enough evidence while there are these important autopsy reports which confirm all the torture and brutal beatings.
And now, regarding the medical negligence, there is one important case of this prisoner which is called Walid Daqqa, where he was sentenced at first to life imprisonment. He holds by the way, and Israeli citizenship. So he was sentenced to life imprisonment and then it was reduced to 36 years imprisonment. He actually was imprisoned for 36 years and after that, they charged him again for smuggling phones. Like, he had to be released, okay, but then they charged him of smuggling phones inside the prison because prisoners do not have any access to their families. And only within these smuggled phones inside the prison, because they are not allowed to speak with their families. So he was charged with that and they added two years to his 36 year. Then he was diagnosed with a very severe bone marrow cancer. And he didn’t have his medical, he didn’t get enough medical care. They didn’t give him the effective medication, which led to his killing. So after 37 year imprisonment, and he was supposed to be released a year before he died inside the prison. And until this day, they are not releasing his body, they are still imprisoning the body of Walid Daqqa. This case actually shows the brutality of the Israeli occupation forces and how they deal with ill prisoners. After this very long period of time of imprisonment, they did not release him. And we tried, lawyers tried, we did all these campaigns, we did the legal work in order to release him to die between his family to die in his house, we knew he would die. So we wanted him to die in his house, but this didn’t happen. So: 37 years in prison, and then he dies in prison. And now they are not giving his body back to his family. So this also shows how the Israelis deal with prisoners and we have hundreds of cases of ill prisoners who are not getting their medication who are neglected medically, which will for sure lead to their death inside the prison.
TFSR: You mentioned before the fact that prisoners are unable to keep clean because the showers are difficult to get to or because water is not available, shampoo is not available. People are being denied new clothing and kept for months in the same clothing they were arrested. Similar to the sort of inhumane and degrading treatment that is described there. There was much footage of civilians since the invasion after October 7 of Gaza, of civilians being held in the streets in their underwear tied and held captive by Israeli occupation forces, an obvious act of humiliation. Well, you’ve already talked about torture. But there are reports that have come out about the use of sexual assault and extrajudicial executions of prisoners by Israeli captors. I wonder if you could talk about this documentation that your organization has?
TN: Regarding the whole situation of Gazan detainees. So after the ground invasion took place, the Israeli forces began conducting massive arrest campaigns. And the thing is that until this day, after eight months, we still don’t have accurate numbers of arrests. We have no information about these prisoners inside the military camps. The only thing we know is that the Israelis announced that they opened two military camps to hold Gazan detainees. One military camp is called Sde Teiman, and it’s in the South. The other one is called Anatot, and it’s near Jerusalem. So, they only announced that they open these two military camps to hold Gazan detainees. Of course, the International Committee of the Red Cross is completely banned from visiting these military camps. We, as lawyers, are completely banned from visiting these military camps. And we get a lot of requests from families asking about your loved one. They have no idea. “Are they killed? Are they in prison? Where are they?” There are hundreds of missing Palestinians; they have forcibly disappeared. The Israelis are imposing the crime of enforced disappearance against Gazan detainees. And we tried to contact, of course, different Palestinian and Israeli organizations to contact the Israeli authorities to disclose any information regarding Gazan detainees. But they were not responding at all. And this is until this day.
So we’re speaking about this whole isolation against Gazan detainees. And within this situation comes the Haaretz newspaper who published three articles regarding Gazan’s details in these military camps. They are revealing information that we never knew. And we only know that from these audits, our publication. So the first one, the first article was regarding the whole situation in the military camp. And it revealed that Gazan detainees are 24/7 handcuffed and blindfolded. And that they only sleep for three hours on very thin mattresses and that they have to stay all the time on their knees. So they cannot sit up straight, they have to stay underneath while they are blindfolded and handcuffed. I only revealed this little information that we didn’t have before.
Then comes the second article, which revealed that more than 27 Gazan detainees have been killed inside these military camps. And unfortunately, until this day, also, we still don’t know their names. We have no idea about the names of these 27 who were killed. Of course, we don’t know the circumstances behind their death, we only knew that from this Haaretz newspaper article. And we are pretty sure that the number is so much bigger because this will going to be revealed, like after this genocide.
And so and the third article was like before two months, it was that they interviewed a doctor who was working in one of the military camps. And he said that he had to amputate the limbs of many Palestinian detainees because they are 24/7 handcuffed and feet cuffed and this led to an infection in their hands and feet and he had to amputate their hands and feet due to that. So he was talking about the duality, it was talking about all this horrible situation in there. They are restrained for a very long period of time, which led to this medical issue of infection, and so, so, and, yes, we have all of this, we knew it from these articles.
And then they started releasing some of the Gazan detainees. I tell you, it’s really hard for us to get to have full access to released detainees from the Gaza Strip because of the genocides still taking place. They actually, they go out from prison looking for their families. Most of them their families are killed, the other ones were displaced so it’s really hard for us to do that. But we did with some of them. We documented cases of released prisoners, and they all confirmed all these harsh treatments, all the torture or the ill-treatment. And one other thing regarding as in details is that at first, the Israelis amended this Unlawful Combatant Law. The Israeli authorities are actually applying the Unlawful Combatant Law against Gazans and this law is actually similar to the Administrative Detention law, which means they can arrest Gazans without presenting any charges against them without any trial. And it can be renewed indefinitely, that detention order can be renewed indefinitely. And they amended this law that they allowed the ban, like they banned the detainees, the detainees from meeting with the lawyer for a period of 180 days, which means six months.
We as lawyers cannot visit or meet with the details. And why is that? This is because they want to prevent us from documenting all the torture committed against them. So it was at the first six months, we were completely banned from visiting because of this amendment. Now, some lawyers have access to some gathered detainees in prisons, not in military. They also confirmed that very heinous and cruel treatment against Gazan detainees things, they let them bark. Like if you want to have food, you have to work, you know, like they are treating them just as dogs. And they are asking that forcing them to bark. And if you don’t bark, you get beaten up. And every day, they raid their cells and they brutally beat them.
This is every day, in addition to the humiliation, just like I said, the barking that they are not allowed to shave their beard or head. They are not allowed to, of course go out to any yard, of course not nothing at all. They are enduring severe conditions, very hard conditions. And really the situation is really hard with Gazan detainees things. They are imposing punitive measures against Gazan detainees. They are all civilians. They have nothing to do, they are all in prison without any charges presented against them. And the courts are only doing all these acts and committing all these acts as punitive measures against Gazan detainees.
TFSR: Because of the political nature of prisons under the Israeli occupation, when you or Addammer are using the term “political prisoner.” Are you referring to anyone who was arrested because of their identity as a Palestinian? Or is there a specific other group or delineation that you’re making with the term political prisoner?
TN: Yeah, so yes, we refer to every Palestinian arrested inside Israeli prisons as the as political prisoners, because the Israelis are trying and aiming to silence Palestinians by putting the largest number possible number of Palestinians behind the bars. And they do this in order to prevent the Palestinians from raising their voices against this illegal occupation, against this ongoing genocide. Every Palestinian inside these presents is a political prisoner, and the Israelis are committing the crime of persecution against Palestinians. They are trying to put all Palestinians behind bars and by doing that, they are trying to be like, they do not want to see any Palestinian rejecting the occupation, or resisting this occupation, or speaking up about this occupation. You know, they are using the charge of incitement against many Palestinians now.
So if you’re a journalist and posting anything as a journalist on your social media, let’s say or on a radio episode, or whatsoever, they can arrest the journalist for speaking up against regarding this issue. And if you post any words of sympathy towards our people in Gaza, I might be imprisoned because of these words of sympathy. So, they are imposing all these measures, they are trying to silence Palestinians by charging them on charges of incitement by putting them under administrative detention without charges and by imposing even the military, these military orders which have to do with all like with all our lives. They are trying to control all our lives and they are doing that and aiming to impose further control enter the repression against Palestinians.
TFSR: Yeah, so university students across the US and in other countries around Europe, for instance, have increasingly been occupying their campuses and facing violent attacks by police, or Zionists of various types for these protests in support of Palestinian liberation and an end to the war, and the occupation.
Do you have any messages for those who are continuing their protests, either in the streets or on the campuses?
TN: Yeah, of course.
First, we as Palestinians, and I might here, speak on behalf of them, thank all the students worldwide all over the world who are taking this, or doing these efforts in solidarity with Palestine, from the bottom of our hearts. And it’s really important for them to know that we see everything and we are sure that this will make a difference, because we know that students are the ones who are going to make the difference in this world. And yes, every little thing they do, and every big thing they d: everything matters for us, and everything will make a difference. So we encourage them to continue.
Of course, with all the solidarity. Of course, it’s really important to also highlight the boycott to boycott, to boycott this illegal occupation. And we know that they call for that they always call for that. So raising this issue, the Palestinian cause is really important worldwide. And, of course, taking action and steps toward ending this illegal occupation is also important. So, yes, we see everything they do and our hearts get big with all the videos we see with all the pictures. And it’s really important for us, and it gives us hope that we will get rid of this illegal occupation and this settler settler colonial regime, which has been imposed against Palestinians for 76 years. So keep up this work, keep up the protesting, keep occupying the universities, and of course, boycotting Israeli universities and boycotting this whole Israeli system, this whole occupation. And, of course, resisting in different ways is really an honor, in all means, is really important in our struggle, in order to achieve victory to finally achieve victory against this brutal occupation.
TFSR:Have the lawyers and workers and volunteers at Addameer faced repression for speaking out and doing the reporting and advocacy that you’re doing?
TN: No, not yet. But it’s important to note that three years ago, the Israeli occupation authorities designated Addameer along with other six organizations as a Terrorist Organization. And they did this designation because of our work, because we speak up regarding the prisoners issue and because of because we document all the violations, I think, prisoners, and of course, it was based on a secret file. So they had no charges against my organization, they have nothing to say, except that this organization is a terrorist organization. And of course, we’ve been working for more than 30 years with Palestinian political prisoners and we know that our professional work led to this designation. So, now we’re not facing anything at the meantime but we might face in the future, of course, because we are designated as a terrorist organization. But we are continuing with our work because we know how important this is and how this issue of Palestinian political prisoners is important to every family in Palestine.
TFSR: I guess the last question is, how can people learn more in support the work of Addameer and others working on the prisoner issue in Palestine?
TN: Yeah, you know, we always speak out, we do all these webinars, all these teach ins in different universities in different countries. And so, and it’s also important to follow our work on our website, addameer.org. And on our social media platforms: we have a page on Instagram, on Facebook and on Twitter. We publish everything there. And, of course, on our website, and anyone can look for anything. And of course, anyone can contact us at our email and ask for anything. We’ll be ready always to answer for any of the of the requests.
TFSR: Thank you very much for having this conversation. I really appreciate it. And thank you for all the work that you and Addameer are doing.
TN: Thank you. Thank you very much.