Hamas official Wasfi Qubha urged international organisations and human rights groups to provide Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons with sanitisers and medical equipment needed to prevent the spread of COVID-19 among them.

In a press release, Qubha urged human rights organisations to pressure the Israeli occupation to take precautionary measures needed to combat the outbreak of the coronavirus among Palestinian detainees in its prisons.  

Qubha called for activating the role of Palestinian embassies and representative offices around the globe in exposing Israeli policy of medical negligence against the Palestinian detainees amid the coronavirus outbreak. 

The former Palestinian minister of prisoner affairs explained that the Israeli occupation had refused a request by representatives for the Palestinian detainees in the Megiddo prison to provide the prisoners with protective masks, asking them to uses socks in a way that showed a disregard for their health and wellbeing. 

Qubha pointed out that denying Palestinian detainees of sanitisers and hygiene supplies by the Israeli occupation amid the COVID-19 outbreak reflected its “premeditated intention” to expose the Palestinian prisoners to the novel coronavirus.

Israeli occupation prisons are not fit for holding Palestinian detainees, Qubha demonstrated, adding that there are almost 1,000 sick prisoners held in Israeli jails, 28 of them suffer from chronic diseases and are at serious risk of catching the novel virus.

Qubha called for releasing all Palestinian detainees from Israeli prisons as the COVID-19 epidemic continues to spread across the world.