Prominent Palestinian hunger striker dies in Israeli custody
Source: Associated Press
Prominent Palestinian hunger striker dies in Israeli custody
By ILAN BEN ZION
May 2, 2023
JERUSALEM (AP) — A high-profile Palestinian prisoner died in Israeli custody on Tuesday after a hunger strike of nearly three months, Israel’s prison service announced. His death set off a rocket barrage from the Gaza Strip and raised fears of a further escalation.
Khader Adnan, a leader of the militant Islamic Jihad group, helped introduce the practice of protracted hunger strikes by individual prisoners as a form of protest against Israel’s mass detention of Palestinians without charge. On Tuesday, the 45-year-old became the first long-term hunger striker to die in Israeli custody.
In response to his death, Palestinian militants in Gaza fired 22 rockets toward populated areas in southern Israel, seriously wounding a 25-year-old man and moderately wounding two others at a construction site in the city of Sderot, Israel’s rescue service said, identifying all three as foreigners. Their nationalities were not immediately clear.
Air raid sirens sounded and Israeli municipal councils opened public bomb shelters. The reverberations and shrapnel punched a hole into the street and charred cars, footage showed. Four rockets were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, authorities said.
-snip-
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinian-hunger-strike-adnan-4b9c28fe71f66bab3a1583f1bddbab9c
