Annie Fitzmaurice

For the past 4 days I have been in an Israeli jail, after being assaulted in the middle of Tel Aviv by police officers without uniform, shoved into an unmarked car and taken across the country to a police station. I was handcuffed and then repeatedly beaten, choked, threatened and insulted by police officers – for no other reason than their sadistic pleasure. I was then taken to Ashkelon prison, where for the course of four days I was dragged around courts and holding cells, strip-searched many times, put in cells with the Israeli far-right, at times denied food and water and kept in the cold. The conditions in prison are as one would expect – the cells are infested with cockroaches and bedbugs, the prisoners are constantly mistreated and neglected, especially those requiring medical support. I watched a man with a severe migraine being denied seeing a doctor for his three day stay and denied even the simplest painkillers like ibuprofen. Another cell mate of mine was screaming in pain for hours throughout the night and was only taken away after he started throwing up and practically passed out. If these are the conditions Israeli Jews are subjected to, you can imagine the conditions for the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza. I now have three new charges against me – assaulting a police officer (completely made up, the exact opposite of what happened), desecrating a memorial (for putting a Free Palestine sticker on the platform where Israelis come to watch Gaza get bombed), and “disturbing public order”. Today I was finally released by the court, but it’s likely that I will be called again. This is crystal clear political persecution, and the pressure on me is ramping up and it’s unclear how long I will be able to continue my work unabated. For press inquiries: +972 533 222 469 (WhatsApp) khrzhanovskiy@gmail.com