File photo shows Palestinian prisoners at an Israeli detention camp in the occupied territories. (Via the Palestinian Information Center)

Ramallah, December 19 (RHC)-- Dozens of Palestinian prisoners held in the Israeli regime's Menashe prison have gone on an open-ended hunger strike in protest at the repressive measures there, two advocacy groups have said.

In a joint statement issued on Wednesday, the Detainees’ and Ex-Detainees’ Commission and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society said the detainees informed their lawyers of their protest during a recent court appearance. 

The detainees said that the camp, located in the north of the occupied West Bank, does not provide warm water, not even during severe cold spells, and it lacks a clinic, with neither a doctor nor a nurse on site.   Some detainees suffer from health issues while all suffer from hunger and a shortage of adequate clothing.

The statement pointed out that the camp is one of several established by the occupying regime since the escalation of its arrest campaigns across the occupied West Bank in October last year. 

The joint statement highlighted the fact that there are dozens of reports from human rights groups documenting the harsh and degrading detention conditions over the years. These have now, it is reported, got worse since October 2023 when Israel launched a campaign of death and destruction in the besieged Gaza Strip in early October 2023. 

Torture and abuse are said to be a feature of life for detainees at the detention camps.

Despite numerous calls from specialist institutions to close these camps, the occupying regime insists on using them for the army’s abuse and torture of detainees, the advocacy groups said. 

Instead of closing such “torture camps”, the Israeli regime is expanding the network of army-run camps built to house Palestinians from Gaza.

Israeli forces have arrested roughly 12,100 Palestinians across the occupied West Bank since October 2023.  The figure does not include Palestinians detained in Gaza, which are estimated in the thousands.

The ongoing arrest campaigns are accompanied by escalating abuse and severe beatings, and verbal and physical threats against detainees and their families, prisoner advocacy groups have said.

Under its policy of administrative detention, the occupying regime detains Palestinians without trial or charge for up to six months; a period which can be extended for an indefinite number of times.

Palestinian detainees have resorted to open-ended hunger strike on frequent occasions to express outrage at their plight under the occupying regime's inhumane detention policy.