RAMALLAH, June 16, 2025 (WAFA) - The Commission of Prisoners' Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners' Club said today that the Israeli Prison Service decided to indefinitely cancel lawyer visits to detainees.
In a joint statement, the Commission and the Prisoners' Club said this move, effective immediately, is attributed to "exceptional circumstances facing detainees since the beginning of the genocide," a situation that is reportedly exacerbating their isolation and heightening anxieties regarding their fate.
They vehemently condemned the decision, noting its troubling coincidence with the postponement of hearings by Israeli military courts. Despite these postponements, sessions for detention extensions and hearings for administrative detainees are reportedly being maintained.
The organizations emphasized that this measure represents a further extension of a "policy of comprehensive isolation" against detainees, which they state has been in practice since the onset of the genocide. This policy, they said, includes the denial of family visits, the prohibition of visits by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and the confiscation of detainees' personal belongings, which would otherwise allow them to monitor external events.
They affirmed that these restrictions have forced detainees into "the harshest and most severe isolation in years."
The statement further highlighted that the recent announcement by Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, regarding a "crackdown on detainees" was "not surprising."
They noted that this sentiment is based on "ongoing policies of repression and abuse, using all types of weapons and arbitrary measures inside detention centers."
These policies, they asserted, have escalated to an "unprecedented level since the beginning of the genocide, with repression becoming a daily policy against detainees."
The Commission and the Prisoners' Club held the Israeli occupation authorities fully responsible for the well-being of "thousands of detainees" in their prisons, affirming that these detainees are subjected to "systematic crimes ranging from physical and psychological torture, to deliberate starvation, and medical neglect."
These crimes, they stated, have resulted in the "deaths of dozens of detainees since the beginning of the genocide," amidst systematic international silence and the continued failure of international institutions to fulfill their humanitarian and legal role.
The organizations reiterated their urgent call to all international institutions, specifically mentioning the ICRC and United Nations agencies, to "assume their legal and moral responsibilities."
They also urged these bodies to "take urgent action to halt these crimes, ensure the protection of detainees, and reactivate oversight and accountability mechanisms for the occupation regime and its prisons."
A.D./ K.F.
