Letter to UN: Freedom for Ahmad Sa’adat and Palestinian prisoners

This letter was delivered to Ban Ki-Moon’s office on July 8, 2009. Statement in Italian | Statement in French | Statement in Portuguese Dear Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-Moon; We, the undersigned […]

This letter was delivered to Ban Ki-Moon’s office on July 8, 2009.

Statement in Italian | Statement in French | Statement in Portuguese

Dear Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-Moon;

We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, call upon you to immediately take action in defense of the lives, health and rights of the over 11,000 Palestinian political prisoners held inside Israeli occupation jails. This number includes numerous elected members of Palestinian Legislative Council, among them Ahmad Sa’adat, General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine; Marwan al-Barghouthi, Fateh leader; Abdel-Aziz Dweik, Hamas leader and President of the Council, just freed after three years in prison, and dozens of other elected political leaders, in addition to thousands of other Palestinian activists, union members, community organizers, fathers, mothers, sons and daughters.

Palestinian prisoners suffer in conditions that violate international standards and norms, and are imprisoned because they refuse to accept a brutal occupation of their land and their people. Ahmad Sa’adat recently waged a nine-day hunger strike in protest of the policy of isolation and solitary confinement that has recently been escalated against Palestinian prisoners. Palestinian prisoners have been denied family visits, at times for years, denied access to all books and magazines, and denied even communication with their fellow prisoners in the isolation units. Palestinian prisoners, including Sa’adat, are currently denied necessary health care and medical treatment.

Palestinian prisoners are placed into isolation because they are national leaders and because the Palestinian prisoner movement has been an inspiration to all Palestinians and all who struggle for freedom. Ahmad Sa’adat’s hunger strike has sparked thousands of people around the world to appeal for his release, as a living example who symbolizes the steadfastness and strength of the Palestinian prisoners amid isolation and dire conditions, and it must compel all of those outside the prisons to act. Many Palestinian and international human rights and social justice organizations have called for the release of Sa’adat and to ensure the safety of his life and health, as well as for freedom and protection for all Palestinian prisoners.

The fate of these 11,000 Palestinian political prisoners is a fundamental issue of justice. Palestinians, in Palestine and in exile, are denied their rights – to return home, to self-determination, and to freedom, and those who seek to secure those rights are subject to imprisonment, whether within the open-air prisons of Gaza under siege or the walled-in West Bank, or the jails of the occupation. The silent, and at times, active, complicity of international agencies, particularly the United Nations, in the denial of Palestinian rights must not continue.

We call upon you to uphold your responsibilities and exert all pressure to end torture, cruel and inhuman treatment of Palestinian prisoners, and to free every Palestinian political prisoner from Israel’s occupation jails.

Sincerely,


Campaign to Free Ahmad Sa’adat

Al-Awda NY 

Al-Awda Newspaper and Publishing House, Chicago
Al-Awda Omaha
Al-Fajr News, Tunisia
Alliance for People’s Health
Almubadara USA
Al-Nakba Awareness Project
A COPPIR (Coordenadoria Municipal de Políticas Públicas para Promoção da Igualdade Racial) Florianapolis, Brazil
American Iranian Friendship Committee
A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition – Act Now to Stop War and End Racism 
Anti-Imperialist Camp 
Artists to End the Occupation
Association Réveil des Consciences
Arab American Community Center, Youngstown, OH
Arab American Union Members Council
Arab Muslim American Federation
Arab Palestinian Cultural Center – Brazil (Centro Cultural Arabe Palestino)
Arab Resource and Organizing Center, San Francisco, CA
Architects and Planners for Justice in Palestine
BAYAN USA
Bay Area Labor Committee for Peace & Justice
Bay Area United Against War 
Brazilian Arab Palestinian Society of Corumba (Sociedade Arabe Palestina Brasileira de Corumba)
Campaign to Free Marwan Barghouti and All Prisoners
Canadian Arab Federation 
Canada Palestine Association – Vancouver 
Catarinense Committee of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – Brazil (Comite catarinense de solidariedade ao povo palestino)
Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid (Toronto)
Comité ‘Libérez-les!’ 
Comité pour une Paix Juste au Proche Orient, Luxembourg
Committee for a Democratic Palestine (Comite democratico Palestino) – Brazil
Committee of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – Argentina
Committee of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – Brazil
Committee of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – Ecuador
Committee of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – Uruguay
Committee of solidarity with the struggle of the Palestinian people (Comite de solidariedade com a luta do povo palestino) – CSLPP – Brazil
Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism
Communist Organization of Greece (KOE) 
Coordination de l’Appel de Strasbourg pour une Paix juste au Proche-Orient 
Danish Communist Party
Droit Solidarite, France 
EuroPalestine

Free Gaza Movement 
Free Mumia Abu-Jamal/NYC 
Free Palestine Alliance
The Freedom Archives
Freedom Road Socialist Organization
French Committee to Free Georges Ibrahim Abdallah (Collectiv pour la libération de Georges Ibrahim Abdallah)
Friends of Al-Aqsa 
General Union of Palestine Students/NY
General Union of Palestine Students/SF Bay Area 
General Union of Workers of Chile
Hammerhard MediaWorks
International Action Center
International Association of Democratic Lawyers 
International Association of People’s Lawyers
International Democratic Federation of Women (Federação Democrática Internacional de Mulheres)
International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network
International Platform Against Isolation (IPAI)
International Platform of Jurists for East Timor, Leiden, Netherlands
International Republican Socialist Network
International Socialist Organization
International Solidarity Movement – France 
Internationalt Forum – Denmark
Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America
Irish Republican Socialist Party
Jericho Movement – NYC
Jewish People’s Liberation Organization 
Justice for Palestinians, San Jose, CA
Kommunistische Initiative Deutschlands (KI)/Communist Initiative Germany 
L’Observatoire Tunisien pour les Droits et les Libertés Syndicales
Left Formations of the Youth, Greece
Middle East Children’s Alliance 
National Boricua Human Rights Network 
National Democratic Action Society of Bahrain
National Lawyers Guild 
National Liberation Council of Bangladesh
New Jersey Solidarity – Activists for the Liberation of Palestine
New Orleans Palestine Solidarity
NYC Labor Against the War
NY Committee For Human Rights in the Philippines
No One Is Illegal – Vancouver 
PalestineFreeVoice
Palestine House

PNN – Palestine News Network
Palestine Solidarity Group – Chicago
Palestine Solidarity Committee – Seattle
Palestine Think Tank 
Palestinian American Youth, Youngstown, OH
The Palestinian Cultural and Political Club of Boston
Palestinian Democratic Committee – Chile 
Palestinian Federation of Chile
Palestinian Youth Network
Palestinian Youth Organization
PATOIS: New Orleans International Human Rights Film Festival
PINAY: Filipino Women’s Organization in Quebec 
PROGRESS Lawyers Network 
Progressive Labor Action Front, Palestine
Progressive Student Action Front, Palestine
Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism!
Revolutionary Communist Group, Britain
Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR) of Ecuador
Secretariat Nationale de la Voie Democratique Maroc
Socialist Action
Socialist Party of Malaysia
Socialist Viewpoint 
SOUL School of Unity & Liberation, Oakland, CA 
Students for a Democratic Society, UNC-Chapel Hill chapter
Sudanese Women’s Union
TLAXCALA activist translators’ collective 
Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees 
Union of the Working People, Greece
US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel
US Palestinian Community Network (USPCN) (Popular Conference)
Vent Libertaire 29, France

Viva Palestina Committee – Niteroi, Brazil (Comite Viva Palestina Niteroi)
Voice of Palestine, Canada 
War Times/Tiempo De Guerra
WESPAC Foundation
Women Against Military Madness
Women’s Peace Speakers Series, Honolulu, Hawaii
Workers Party of Belgium
Workers Party of New Zealand

World Federation of Democratic Youth