Court authorizes transfer of administrative detainees to solitary confinement

Tuesday, October 13, 2015, 18:54 On Tuesday, October 13 the Lod and Be’er Sheva District Courts authorized the transfer of the Jewish administrative detainees to solitary confinement in the Eshel Prison.
On October 7, the Prison Service violated the law when without an order signed by the Defense Minister they transferred two (Meir Ettinger and Eviatar Slonim) of the three Jewish administrative detainees to solitary confinement (Mordechai Meyer has not yet been transferred.) The Defense Minister subsequently issued a new order intended to retroactively authorize the transfer. Judges Avraham Tal and Gad Gideon ruled on Tuesday, October 13, on the cases of all three administrative detainees and decided that the transfer be authorized. Honenu attorneys Adi Kedar and Sima Kochav represented the detainees.
On the night of Monday, October 12, Meir Ettinger ended his hunger strike after being allowed to speak to his close family members, including his wife. Ettinger began his hunger strike on October 8, one day after he was, without being given an explanation, transferred to solitary confinement in the Eshel Prison and was denied the right to speak to anyone on the phone. He stated that he would end his hunger strike upon being permitted to speak to his wife.
Currently Ettinger is in solitary confinement in a separate wing and Slonim is in solitary confinement in a high security wing. Mordechai Meyer has not yet been transferred from an open wing in the Rimonim Prison due to an order to delay carrying out the transfer given by a ruling from the Central District Court. All three administrative detainees were initially held in open wings, particularly open wings designated for religious prisoners and now the severity of their remand conditions has sharply increased.
Honenu strongly objects to the abuse of the Jewish administrative detainees by the Prison Service: “We are pleased that at least Ettinger has been allowed to speak to his family. However we object to the transfer of the administrative detainees to solitary confinement without just cause. It is important to remember that the administrative detainees have not been accused of anything and are held in remand only by the force of the Defense Minister’s signature which stemmed from inappropriate media pressure.”