Palestinian Prisoners’ Day is a day of challenge and confrontation, emphasizing the issue of prisoners
On the occasion of Palestinian Prisoners’ Day, we salute every prisoner, the heroes and heroines of the battles of will and steadfastness, to every flower and cub, to the sick prisoners, administrative detainees and imprisoned leaders, led by the imprisoned General Secretary, Comrade Ahmad Sa’adat, Marwan Barghouthi, Hassan Salameh, Wajdi Jawdat, Anas Jaradat, Bassam Kandaji and the long line of leaders who represent the national struggle and the prisoners’ cause.
On this occasion, we make a particular salute to the martyrs of the prisoners movement and to all of those engaged in confrontation and the struggle for victory. We are firmly committed to see each battle of confrontation with the Prison Service and its instruments of repression and intelligence agencies as a collective battle. Every action initiated by any faction is all of our battle.
We also congratulate the longest-serving woman prisoner, Lena Jarbouni, on this occasion of her freedom after 15 years in Israeli jails.
In this context, we affirm that we stand hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder in any struggle waged by the prisoners, and we consider the decision to engage in the battle of dignity and honor against the jailer, beginning on Monday, April 17, Palestinian Prisoners’ Day 2017, to be one which we support and which we are part of. This comes in two ways, both through the decisions and guidelines for the comrades to engage in the battle, and through approving a program of support for the strike in all prisons and among our comrades outside.
In this context of high appreciation and support for this battle and all the heroic prisoners who will engage in it, we affirm our continued struggle for the unity of the prisoners’ movement and the escalation of confrontation against the prison administration.
Thus, we call on all the Palestinian people and their supporters and friends around the world to stand side by side with the prisoners in their continuing battles inside the prisons, escalating the mass movement to support the battle of wills, challenge and confrontation, and to once again reaffirm the centrality of the cause of the prisoners.
We also call upon all human rights, humanitarian and media institutions to support our prisoners in order to develop a unified national program at all levels for more effective results.
We call upon the leaders of the Palestinian people to make unremitting efforts to uphold their responsibility for the prisoners and the martyrs and do everything possible to defend them and support their steadfastness until victory in the ongoing battles against the prison service, through all forms of action for their liberation.
On this occasion, we urge all to close ranks in the field of national unity and urge our Front, all of the national and Islamic forces and factions and the masses of our people to devote their efforts and time in service of the cause of the prisoners.
We hope that the culmination of all of these battles waged by the prisoners inside the prisons, with the popular support inside and outside Palestine, will be to unify the prisoners’ movement, in light of the traditions and norms established by the prisoners’ movement for over 50 years, of prisons as revolutionary schools which unite all forces behind revolutionary national ideals.
We urge all actions and intensified work in the Palestinian, Arab and international arenas, everyhere in the world in support of the prisoners’ cause.
Salutes of Palestinian Prisoners’ Day – Glory to the martyrs – Freedom for the prisoners of freedom
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Prison Branch
April 16, 2017