The DFLP rejects the conviction by an Israeli court of the distinguished leader Ibrahim Abu Hijla and calls upon the Palestinian people and its national forces to intensify the struggle to free the Palestinian prisoners

The Israeli military court in Ofar handed down a sentence of 25 years in prison to the distinguished leader Ibrahim Abdel-Khadder Abu Hijla, member of the Palestinian National Council and member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP). The court accused the Palestinian leader of directing the National Brigades of Palestinian Resistance, the armed wing of the DFLP in the West Bank, and of giving orders to armed cells to carry out military actions against the Zionist army and colonists.

The conviction was supported with information classified as secret by the military institution, something which was used to prevent the information from being disclosed to the defense.

As was known, the combatant Ibrahim Abdel-Khadder Abu Hijla refused to strike an agreement with the Israeli military admitting to charges against him in exchange for the reduction in his sentence. Abu Hijla considered his arrest and his appearance before the court as two political measures of Israeli reprisal; these violate provisions in the Geneva Convention regarding the treatment of the civilians in times of war.

The DFLP renounced the decision of the Israeli court’s conviction of comrade Abu Hijla, who returned to the homeland in 1996 and assumed several responsibilities in the forefront of political, mass and trade union struggles; he was also for a long time one of the leaders of the General Union of Palestinian Students.

The official spokesman of the DFLP considered that that repressive conviction of one of the leaders of the Intifada constitutes an attempt to condemn the legitimate national struggle, just as happened to other Palestinian leaders who are at this moment in Israeli jails, though documents and international agreements guarantee and accept legality of the fight against occupation.

The DFLP spokesman called upon the Palestinian people and its national forces to intensify the struggle to free prisoners in the occupier’s jails, particularly the oldest, some of whom have been imprisoned for three decades.

The Front demanded President Mahmoud Abbas and the National Palestinian Authority to show greater concern for the leader Abu Hijla's cause and the cause of all prisoners; The DFLP urged the president should not proceed in negotiations and agreements with Israel without achieving concrete progress on the issue of Palestinian detainees.

The DFLP reminded that all organizations of the resistance condition the continuance of the “truce” on the liberation of all prisoners – without restriction or discrimination; this means that while Israel continues imprisoning thousands of Palestinian fighters and does not cease with its campaigns of arrests and unjust condemnations, the truce will be threatened with collapse.

Central Information Office of the
Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine

October 8, 2005