Detention camps began to celebrate the day of land, as well as al other national occasions, by strikes and other activities. Generally speaking, struggle in the detention camps has become an integral part of the struggle outside.

Ever since detention camps have their own national traditions in their dealing with the administration or the court, on the one hand, and in the relation among detainees and the role they play in prisons, on the other hand. These traditions that detainees put forth by their hard struggle and precious sacrifice, have become a great weapon in the hands of the whole Palestinian national movement. Prisons have become schools to prepare revolutionary fighters who have a deep faith in their struggle till victory is achieved.

When the Israeli authorities were obliged to set free the majority of militants through a process of prisoners exchange, prisons administration tried to destroy the gains and traditions that the heroic detainees achieved, but the revolutionary leader ship of prisons, foremost of whom is comrade Omar Al-Qassem blocked the way to this attempt.

In this context comrade Omar wrote a letter in which he says: Prisons are exposed to a brutal attack nowadays, aiming to liquidate the achievements of the captivated movement to set them back into the previous detention conditions that were prevalent in the first years of detention. Vis-à-vis this attack, which is concentrated in Jened prison, we should continue our struggle, not only to defend what we have achieved of gains, but also to improve them. The strike of February 1987 succeeded in the confirmation of those revolutionary gains and traditions.

During the great popular Intifada in the occupied territories, comrade Omar stated the tasks of the captivated movement, to Al-Hadaf magazine which issues in prison. He said:
“In the conditions of the Intifada, and through its positive effects on the international level, we may announce an open comprehensive hunger strike, demanding the Israeli government to concede our position as political detainees, to whom the fourth Geneva Convention is to be applied. If we reach an agreement with the Unified National Leadership to fight this battle, our main task would be to exact our characteristic as political prisoners”.

The said achievement would not be mentioned on the long hard way of struggle without the militant Omar Al-Qassem and his likes of militants, experienced in struggle for they constitute a strong symbol for thousands of militants. The prominent characteristic in comrade Al-Qassem was his steadfastness represented by his deep conviction while exposed to serve measures and threats were about to kill him. After 25 days of the hunger strike in Al-Ramlah prison he, along with three of his comrades, were put in individuals’ cells. He was let to choose either to break the strike with all his strength, and loudly shouted, while was carried by soldiers after he lost ability to walk because of violent beating: “Don’t eat. Fear nothing”.

His stand whetted us with enthusiasm and strength. In Ashkelon prison in 1987, while the prison administration tried to suppress the Intifada of the detainees, it called for comrade Al-Qassem and ordered him to kneel down, but he refused strongly. They assaulted him, but he faced them with all his strength and indescribable courage till they overcame him. They tried to suppress him before the detainees by means of beating and torture. His mouth and nose bled, yet he insisted not to respond to the administration’s conditions.

When a group of the DFLP’s revolutionary armed forces carried out the heroic operation of Maalot in Galilee (Al-Jaleel) prison administration called for comrade Al-Qassem. They blindfolded his eyes and led him in a helicopter to Maalot. He was taken then in an armoured vehicle. They asked him to call on the Fedayeen to surrender, resorting by this to “an Israeli trick”. Comrade Omar refused to carry out this task; “the trick”. When they insisted, using various pressures, comrade Omar shouted through the loudspeaker: “Comrades, carry out the orders of your leadership in details and don’t respond to any other demands”. Soon the soldiers snatched the loudspeaker and beat him into the armoured vehicle. He was brought back to prison, and transformed then to a cell, as a punishment for his valiant action.

Omar’s steadfastness was also embodied during an interview with Navon in 1987, in prison. Navon asked Omar to promise not to carry out any political activity in return of setting him free and allowing him to live in Jerusalem. Omar firmly replied: “I have spent twenty years in prison and I do not mind my own fate rather than the cause of my people. As long as the incubus of occupation oppresses our people, I will struggle. There will come the day when I will be free”.

In addition to Omar’s major characteristic of national steadfastness, there are other characteristics which made his revolutionary role comprehensive, the most important of which is his intellectual and political role in the detention camp.

This role stems from his democratic unionist frontal conception about all forces. He was one of the leaders who called for national unification early in prisons. He struggled to mobilize all national forces regardless of their size or ideological conception. This attitude constituted an access to his political, intellectual, and cultural role in the framework of the whole captivated movement.

It is agreed on by consensus that comrade Omar is one of the first leaders who introduced the progressive ideology to the detainees. We may find many progressive comrades inside and outside the territories who are disciples of comrade Al-Qassem on the intellectual and theoretical levels. At the beginning, he has been summarizing his memories for circulation and discussion. Afterward he began to translate books from the library, and re-wrote them. Other times, he summarized them to circulate them among detainees. He also depended on his communications with the leadership of the DFLP in the occupied territories. These correspondences were discussions of political and theoretical issues that would help him in his lectures and summaries.

He received very valuable letters, according to what he has been stating in prison. When the captivated movement exacted an access to books and newspapers, main subjects became available to all detainees.

Comrade Omar resorted to open lectures at night to discuss subjects as the development of Palestinian national cause, the political programme of the DFLP an its ideological and political literature, historical materialism, dialectical materialism, and the history of philosophy. In big political gatherings, he made prolonged explanations and Analyses to the dimensions of such issues, definitely the events of September 1970, October war, and the transitional programme adopted by the PLO in 1974.

In a smaller framework he organized cadre courses. On of these courses lasted for nearly a year, and graduated a group of comrades in a cadre position.

He showed a special concern in the popular war, and the Vietnamese and Algerian experiences. He was also interested in literature and poetry. One of these comrades said: “In one of our meetings, comrade Omar asked one of us to read a story written by Michael Naimeh. Who en the story was read, he made a discussion and Analysis about it, with participation of a big number of detainees”.

On the eve of the PNC 19th session in Algeria, comrade Omar led the political discussions in all prisons and detention centres to formulate the present tasks of the Palestinian national movement during the Intifada. He played the major role in unifying the political attitudes of the detainees, who demanded the 19th session to declare the establishment of the Palestinian state, and the formulation of the Palestinian programme.

In addition to his political and intellectual role, comrade Omar had some other activities like issuance of papers, writings, dialogues and the likes. He was one of the first detainees to take the initiative of issuing papers into the detention camps. When detainees of a certain organization came to have their own paper, he proposed the project of a unified magazine. This project succeeded sometimes, retreated in others. He was mainly interested in writing about the positions and affairs of the detainees. He wrote 34 topics which tackled a valuable representation of the detainees’ conditions, the phases of captivated movement, experiences and lessons of the strike, and the behaviour of detainees on various levels.

Evaluations of some comrades who were with comrade Omar in the detention camps most of the time, indicate that he issued “126” booklets which discuss various items, including the political phases of the current Palestinian revolution. He always encouraged talents through writing especially to Al-Mulhaq Al-Adabi magazine, which graduated a considerable number of writers. He also dedicated a long time for teaching the English language in particular, and the Arabic and French languages in general, and some other academic subjects, aiming at improving the cultural level of detainees.

Foremost of his concerns was to obliterate illiteracy. Omar said: “Illiteracy should be obliterated as soon as possible”. One of the comrades said: “When Omar knew that I do not read, he said: You will soon have an educational course. Some months later, when I wrote the first letter to my family, I felt how much great is this militant. When I learnt how to read and write, I asked him to teach me the English language. He laughed saying that learning languages for a person in my position is like fruits and I should eat first Myjadarah and Mahshi then a melon. In other words, I should study politics and the conceptions of the organization, and the language comes after. He refused to give Marxist books to detainees who have not yet read and discussed the history of the Palestinian struggle”.

“Comrade Omar was really committed to struggle”. One of the comrades said, “I do not exaggerate to say that Omar and his likes had not a time of their own, but they have been living for their people. They were the candle which burns itself to lighten the way for others”.

The committed character of Omar has its deep human dimensions that affected his comrades in prisons. He, for example had a special treatment with Arab Syrian, Egyptian and Iraqi detainees, since they were separated for their families and were not visited. He always made sure that he met all their necessary needs through his relations with his family and the families of the Palestinian detainees. He insisted that they share him his visits.

When there have been prisoner exchanges, the majority of his comrades were set free. His name was not in the same list. His great attitude then embodied the deep human dimensions of his character. In a gathering that included all the detainees who were to be set free, he said: “It is a great national achievement. Now we live a national wedding and we should do all the best to let it succeed. We, who will stay in prison, should never be sad so that our comrades and brothers, who are to be set free, do not feel destitute of the happiness of freedom, that we should share with them”. He proposed to celebrate this occasion and participated in it actively. When the detainees were set free, he wrote to one of them: “I feel so much happy for your freedom, as if I swim in a sea of ecstasy. This is not an exaggeration because it is not possible for a person like me, after all what has happened, to feel living without this deep overwhelming feeling of happiness for the freedom of a big number of dear comrades”.

He went on saying: “I am really pleased to know of the marriage of some of our freed comrades. As for myself, I could not imagine that my marriage would be postponed till now, yet I am optimistic to marry at the age of 50. Sometimes I think that I will not have young children or I will not be a grandfather, but this thought does not reflect the truth behind it because the apparent change in the age of a detainee gives me a feeling of being a father and a grandfather at once. Many of the detained young men see in me a father, which makes me happy, because I really love them as sons. Some of them are very young and love me as a grandfather, others see in me a brother. In fact I live among a family in which each one loves the other. Love is the fruit of giving, and the happy person is the one who could make a giving of his life. Yet I still feel an overwhelming desire for freedom”.

In one of his letters on July 31, 1986, Omar promoted his humanitarianism and translated his intellectual development in a scientific view of the conflict with the Israeli enemy. He said: “We will not allow hatred, fascist and racial Israeli practices to create a desire in ourselves to respond in the same way, and to have a racial look toward Judaism. We will fight the enemy in a way based on national and human values, and peace, though we suffer of the tragedies that they create by aggression and racial practices against the Palestinian people, the Arab people, and the Israelis themselves”.

The great heart stopped beating. The great national leader Omar Mohamoud Al-Qassem fell martyr in the prisons of the Israeli occupation on June 4th, 1989. He suffered of a chronic disease, as a result of the Israeli government’s procrastination of treatment, and refusal to set him free for medical treatment outside prisons. The Israeli government ignored all the appeals of the international and humanitarian institutions and organizations that called, for two months, to set the great militant free; and left him suffering of the chronic disease in the hospital of the prison.

The great leader fell martyr after a period of 21 years spent in prisons of occupation, which is the longest period spent by a political militant there.

He deserves the little of Palestine’s Mandela. Al-Qassem passed away, leaving a rich heritage for militants inside and outside prisons, and for the people who were inspired by his commitment and steadfastness, along with his comrades, an experience of steadfastness in the battle of conflicted wills, in the great popular Intifada, till the end of occupation and the achievement of national independence. Comrade Omar did all the best for the freedom of his people, and rose as a star that lightens the way for victory. The people pay their sincere son great respect, when 10.000 of sons of Jerusalem celebrated Al-Qassem wedding. Masses of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, including hundreds of his disciples, followed Omar’s funeral procession, to confirm the continuation of Omar’s march, the way of freedom and independence.