PLO libel: Israel deliberately leaves child prisoners exposed to Coronavirus
- PLO: Israel lets “the fangs of the Coronavirus” threaten Palestinian prisoners
The exploitation of the Corona pandemic by the Palestinian Authority to incite hatred of Israel, as documented by Palestinian Media Watch, continues unabated. This in spite of the ongoing daily aid and supplies Israel is giving to the PA to prevent an outbreak in the PA areas.
One PA libel claims that Israel is intentionally trying to infect Palestinian prisoners – i.e., terrorists – with the Coronavirus, and particularly refrains from protecting the younger prisoners, causing “a holocaust” in the prisons, as one op-ed in the official PA daily called it.
These libels have been reinforced by two videos published by the PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs using cardboard models of a street and prison cells. One video shows a tank aiming its cannon at a child standing in the street while Coronavirus particles outside the barred window of a prison cell are threatening a child prisoner inside. Coronavirus particles also rub against the handcuffed hands of a real child standing with his hands chained inside the cardboard model, while a child’s voice is heard singing.
Text on screen: “Palestinian Children’s Day”
“More than 200 children in the occupation’s prisons”
“Between the jailor’s violence and the fangs of the Coronavirus”
“#The_prisoners_are_in_danger”Lyrics: “We came to bless you
And we ask you on the holiday [of Palestinian Children’s Day]
Why don’t we have holidays or decorations?
O world! My land is burned
My land’s freedom is stolen
Our skies dream and ask the days:
Where are the beautiful sun and flying doves?
O world! My land is burned
My land’s freedom is stolen
My little land – little like me
Return peace to it and give us a childhood
Give us a childhood
Give us peace”Posted text on Facebook page of the PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs: “On Palestinian Children’s Day”
[Facebook page of the PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs, April 6, 2020]
In the second video, the PLO repeats the libel that Israel purposefully endangers the lives of the Palestinian terrorist prisoners, neglecting to protect them from the Coronavirus. In the cardboard model of a prison, huge Coronavirus particles are banging on the doors and a hand dressed as a Coronavirus particle is trying to force open a prison cell window. The voice of PA Prime Minister has been added, stating that the PA “consider the occupation responsible for protecting the prisoners and demand the immediate release of all of them, and particularly the sick, the children, and the women.” Posting the video on Facebook, the PLO commission wrote:
“Between the violence of the prisons and the fangs of the Coronavirus
#Release_them”[Facebook page of the PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs, April 6, 2020]
Lyrics: “O jailor, O the darkness of the prison cell”
Voice of PA Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh: “We consider the occupation responsible for protecting the prisoners and demand the immediate release of all of them, and particularly the sick, the children, and the women.”
Texts on screen: “#The_prisoners_are_in_danger”
“#Release_them_
Coronavirus_threatens_them!”[Facebook page of the PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs, April 6, 2020]
The official PA daily also used the term “between the fangs of Israel and the Coronavirus” to demonize Israel when reporting on statements by Fatah’s Commission of Martyrs, Prisoners, and Wounded in Gaza, which claimed Israel “exploits the Coronavirus to annihilate the Palestinian prisoners”:
Headline: “The bodies and lives of the Palestinian prisoners are being burned between the fangs of Israel and the Coronavirus”
“The Commission of Martyrs, Prisoners, and Wounded in the Fatah Movement’s Supreme Leadership Council in the Gaza Strip emphasized that danger is encircling the Palestinian prisoners from all sides, due to the violations and crimes in the occupation prison and the spread of the Corona pandemic.
Commission Spokesman Nashat Al-Wahidi said that the occupation government is going too far and specializing in torturing the prisoners and negating their elementary human rights given the epidemic’s spread…
He warned against the occupation’s exploitation of the Coronavirus in order to annihilate the Palestinian prisoners, on the pretext that the virus spread and got out of control. He noted that there is a stream of racist statements being made by the decision making elite in the occupation government, which call to kill the prisoners (sic., PMW found no evidence of such statements).”[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, April 5, 2020]
The PA-funded Prisoners’ Club also hinted that Israel deliberately doesn’t release prisoners who have finished serving their sentence so that they can be infected with the Coronavirus:
“The [PA-funded] Prisoners’ Club warned against a trick that the occupation’s [Israeli] Prison Service (IPS) is plotting, which begins by intentionally delaying the release of the prisoners whose sentence has ended or is about to end… The Prisoners’ Club explained in a statement yesterday, Friday [April 3, 2020], that the IPS has stopped ‘the administrative [detention]’ that it uses in order to reduce the crowding in the prisons. This is despite the urgent need for its implementation today given the gathering concerns over the spread of the Coronavirus in the ranks of the prisoners, and given the repeated demands to release prisoners. This is causing us to wonder about the reasons for this measure being stopped now.”
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, April 4, 2020]
PMW already reported that the PA is spreading libels and lies that Israel is deliberately trying to spread the virus among Palestinians by spitting on them and their property.
The following are longer excerpts of the reports cited above and additional reports claiming Israel is endangering the lives of the prisoners:
Headline: “The Prisoners’ Club warned against the Israeli Prison Service’s foot-dragging in releasing the prisoners whose sentence has ended”
“The [PA-funded] Prisoners’ Club warned against a trick that the occupation’s [Israeli] Prison Service (IPS) is plotting, which begins by intentionally delaying the release of the prisoners whose sentence has ended or is about to end, by stopping the implementation of the so-called ‘administrative [detention],’ in whose framework prisoners are released before the end of what is supposed to be the imposed sentence according to a schedule depending on the prisoners’ sentence.
The Prisoners’ Club explained in a statement yesterday, Friday [April 3, 2020], that the IPS has stopped ‘the administrative [detention]’ that it uses in order to reduce the crowding in the prisons. This is despite the urgent need for its implementation today given the gathering concerns over the spread of the Coronavirus in the ranks of the prisoners, and given the repeated demands to release prisoners. This is causing us to wonder about the reasons for this measure being stopped now.
The club commented on information that has been arriving since yesterday morning, according to which the IPS demanded that the prisoners who had monetary fines imposed on them and whose release date is approaching pay them urgently, and this is an additional sign that raises additional amazement.”
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, April 4, 2020]