RAMALLAH, Wednesday, February 17, 2021 (WAFA) – A Palestinian prisoner in Israeli custody has contracted the novel coronavirus, the Prisoners’ Affairs Commission said on Wednesday.

It announced in a statement that Wafa Shalabi, who was detained several days ago in a raid in Ramallah city, underwent a Covid-19 test in the notorious Israeli detention and interrogation facility of Asqalan, and his test result was positive.

It added that an Israeli military court extended on Tuesday the detention of Shalabi for 11 days, citing the need to complete investigation as a pretext.

This brings the total number of prisoners infected with the virus in all Israeli detention facilities to 362.

Israel’s widely condemned practice of administrative detention that allows the detention of Palestinians without charge or trial for renewable intervals ranging between three and six months based on undisclosed evidence that even a detainee’s lawyer is barred from viewing.

The US State Department has said in past reports on human rights conditions for Palestinians that administrative detainees are not given the “opportunity to refute allegations or address the evidentiary material presented against them in court.”

Amnesty International has described Israel’s use of administrative detention as a “bankrupt tactic” and has long called on Israel to bring its use to an end.

Palestinian detainees have continuously resorted to open-ended hunger strikes as a way to protest their illegal administrative detention and to demand an end to this policy, which violates international law.

K.F.