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West Bank Seeing New Wave Of Anti-Israel Violence

Palestinian anger is soaring following the cancer death of a prisoner in Israeli custody and the killing of a protester in Tulkarem, reports Daoud Kuttab.
A stone-throwing Palestinian protester looks from behind a make-shift barricade during clashes with Israeli soldiers following the funeral of Maysara Abu Hamdeya in the West Bank city of Hebron April 4, 2013. Thousands of mourners turned out on Thursday for the funerals of three Palestinians, including two teenagers killed by Israeli army gunfire in some of the worst violence in the occupied West Bank in years. The upsurge in unrest was triggered on Tuesday by the death of Hamdeya, a 64-year-old prisoner se

The death of Maysara Abu Hamdieh is not the first time a Palestinian prisoner has passed away while behind bars. Less than two months earlier, 30-year-old Arafat Jaradat died while being held in the Megiddo prison. However, the circumstances of the death of Abu Hamdieh, 64, touched a nerve. The fact that he was suffering from an advanced stage of throat cancer and left to die without any serious treatment reflected the sort of mercilessness that incites the anger of an entire nation.

This Palestinian anger is not limited to the lack of medical care in prisons. It comes at a time when a number of prisoners have been on hunger strike for a long period without any response from the Israelis. The lack of response to the strike by prisoners like Samer Issawi, who is being held without trial or charge, has captured the imagination of many inside and outside of Palestine.

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