When President Barack Obama visited Bethlehem, the loudest group of protesters were families of Palestinian prisoners, many of whom have husbands and sons locked up in Israeli jails. Some of the families were demanding that the Israelis honor promises made to release those held from before the Oslo agreements, other families complained that they have not been allowed to meet their loved ones for years. Yet, a third group said sick prisoners were not receiving appropriate medical care. According to the son of Maysara Abu Hamdia, who died Tuesday [April 2] after his cancer went untreated, that is exactly what happened.

Maysara Abu Hamdia, 64, was a colonel with the Palestinian Preventive Security Service in 2002 when he was arrested and charged with multiple offenses, mostly assisting Hamas operatives. According to Tariq Abu Hamdia, the prisoner’s oldest son, the Israelis had nothing on his father. They couldn’t extract a confession and had no serious evidence,” he said in a phone interview from Virginia Tech where he is finishing his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering.

Nevertheless, after four years awaiting trial, an Israeli military court sentenced him to 25 years. Abu Hamdia appealed the verdict and so did the Israeli military prosecutor. A year later, a three-judge military court ruled 2-1 to increase his sentence to life.

Tariq says, while his father was serving his prison term in the Remon prison, his health began to deteriorate. “Last August, my dad started to have a bad cough, sometimes coughing up blood. He had a hard time swallowing and his repeated requests for treatment went unanswered.” Tariq says it took five months before an Israeli prison doctor checked him and told the old man that he had throat cancer.