Hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated today in the city of Baqa al-Gharbiyye in the 1948-occupied territories demanding Israeli occupation authorities to immediately release prisoner Walid Daqqa, a Palestinian in Israeli prisons since 1986 who is currently battling death as a result of advanced bone marrow cancer. The protesters raised pictures of prisoner Daqqa and Palestinian flags, in addition to banners calling for his immediate release. Some of the banners read, “Walid’s freedom is our demand”, “Walid needs family and treatment”, and “Walid is done with his unjust sentence”. Daqqa is a Palestinian writer and activist who has been imprisoned by Israel since 1986 for his resistance of the Israeli occupation. In December 2022, he was diagnosed with advanced bone marrow cancer and was declared in urgent need of a transplant, but has not yet had a transplant. On May 22, Daqqa was transferred to the intensive care unit at the Assaf Harofeh hospital south of Tel Aviv due to further health complications. But three days later, Israeli authorities transferred him back to the Ramleh prison’s clinic in Israel, which is notorious for its difficult conditions, despite calls by rights groups to keep him hospitalised for constant monitoring and treatment if he is not released. His imprisonment also violates the 1993 Oslo Accords, which had a clause for the release of all Palestinian prisoners detained prior to the signing of the agreement.

Source: En – Palestine news & Information Agency – WAFA