A third freed hunger striker, Ayman Sharawneh, originally from Dura, Hebron, but who has been deported to Gaza, describes hunger strikes as the "last bullet" in a fight for freedom that could possibly end in death. Sharawneh, like Adnan and others we talked to, was bitter about the lack of adequate support he received while dying in jail.
"All organizations, Palestinian or international, usually fall short," he says. "They spring into action after the prisoner had gone through many days of torture."
He says that two years and eight months after he was deported to Gaza, he is experiencing severe pain throughout his body, particularly in his kidneys.
While undergoing the extended hunger strike "I started to lose my hair, suffered from constant nausea, sharp pain in my guts, threw up yellow liquid, then dark liquid, then I could hardly see anything. I had an excruciating headache and then I began to suffer from fissures all over my skin and body."
He agrees with Adnan that 'individual hunger strikes' should not be understood as a self-centered act. "Mohammed Al-Qeq is not striking for himself," says Adnan. "He is striking on behalf of all political prisoners," whose number is estimated by prisoners' rights group Addameer at nearly 7,000.
According to Adnan, the issue of hunger strikes should not be seen as a battle within Israeli jails, but as part and parcel of the Palestinian people's fight against military occupation.
While the three prisoners affirmed their solidarity with Al-Qeq, they called for a much greater support for the hunger-striking journalist and thousands like him, many of whom are held indefinitely under administrative detentions.
The list of well-known Palestinian hunger strikers exceeds Al-Qeq, Adnan, Allan and Sharawneh and includes many others, not forgetting Samir Issawi, Hana Shalabi, Thaer Halahleh and Bilal Thiab. But what all of these former hunger strikers seem to have in common is their insistence that their battles were never concerned with the freedom of individuals only, but of an entire group of desperate, oppressed and outraged people.
(With reporting by Yousef Aljamal)
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