Ahmad Manasra was arrested at 13 and kept in solitary confinement for years. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia in prison and was at serious risk of self-harm. His release to a remote location far from his family was Israel’s final act of torture.
Israeli prison authorities refuse to end Ahmad Manasra’s solitary confinement, despite his serious risk of suicide and self-harm. In doing so, Israel is effectively condemning him to a slow death.
The ways in which we allow our work to impact us is also a necessary recognition that the echoes of all the stories we report on will inevitably become parts of us.
On Tuesday, an Israeli District court extended the solitary confinement of 20-year-old Palestinian detainee, Ahmad Manasra, for an additional six months. Israeli Prison Services and authorities attempt to justify Manasra’s isolation by claiming that he poses a threat to his own life, but Manasra’s lead defense lawyer, Khaled Zabarqa, told Amnesty that “the repeated extensions of his solitary confinement are destroying him.”
Ahmad Manasra’s childhood was stolen from him by Israeli military courts. His life mirrors those of thousands of Palestinian children who have been targeted by Israel since birth.
An Israeli court postponed a hearing for Ahmad Manasra for the third time on Wednesday, forcing him back into solitary confinement. “The world needs to move urgently, time is not on our side. Every day that passes is a loss,” Manasra’s lawyer Khaled Zabarqa tells Mondoweiss.
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Manasra’s lawyers and family have stepped up their campaign to demand his freedom, after years of harsh interrogations and abuse coupled with prolonged stints in solitary confinement which led to a severe deterioration of his mental health.
The worldwide movement to immediately release Ahmad Manasra from Israeli prison is gathering momentum through an international campaign initiated by the Palestine-Global Mental Health Network.
The Palestinian-Global Mental Health Network calls on clinicians globally and locally to demand that the Israeli state immediately release Ahmad Manasra.