The Palestinian Prisoners Studies Center (PPSC) confirmed that the occupation is still detaining in its jails 12 prisoners suffering from cancer, with its different forms.
The number of the prisoners with cancer has decreased after the release of the captive Nabil Naim Natsheh, from the city of al-Khalil, who suffers from the disease and who had served 15 months in the Negev desert prison.
The Director of the PPSC, researcher Riyad al-Ashqar, pointed out that prisoners with cancer are exponentially suffering from custody, the prisons' harsh conditions, the occupation violations and the deprivation of all their rights, in addition to their illness and the policy of medical neglect.
Ashqar pointed out that the health of the prisoner Mutassim Raddad, 27, from Tulkarem, who suffers from cancer, has recently seriously deteriorated.
Mutassim, who has been held in Ramla prison hospital, started suffering cardiac problems, chronic intestinal inflammations, and severe and continuous bleeding, which caused him anemia. The doctors decided that he has to undergo surgery to remove all his intestines, to which Mutassim has approved after consulting a medical committee from abroad.
The researcher Ashqar also noted that the health of prisoner Khalil Ibrahim Abu Hadrous, who also suffers from cancer has deteriorated, adding that he had undergone surgery to romove a cancerous tumor a year ago and that he is receiving chemotherapy and in constant need for medication.
Ashqar demanded all the international institutions and bodies, in particular the World Health Organization and Doctors Without Borders, to urgently send medical committees to visit the Israeli prisons in order to see for themselves the conditions of the patient prisoners and to intervene to save their lives and release them.
