Dalal Awawdeh, the wife of Islamic Jihad operative Khalil Awawdeh who has been on hunger strike for over 180 days demanding the cancellation of his administrative detention, said on Tuesday that her husband is in serious condition and that his weight has dropped to 38 kg.
She stated that her husband's demand is just and that all he is asking for is freedom and nothing more than that, calling on international organizations to act urgently to free him.
In a video message from the hospital, a skinny Khalil Awawdeh, speaking slowly and in a weak voice, said that nothing was left of his body but skin and bones, but this does not express the weakness of the Palestinian people, but rather the true face of the "occupation" which claims to be a democratic state while it is detaining a person without an indictment being filed against him.
Awawdeh further said that the Palestinian cause is just and the fight will continue regardless of the price that will be charged, as he repeated the message, "No to administrative detention."
The Central Command recently froze Awawdeh's administrative detention as long as he is in the hospital. Later, the judges of the Supreme Court ruled that the court has no room to intervene in the decision to keep Awawdeh under arrest despite his medical condition.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court once again rejected the petition to release Awawdeh on the grounds that there has been no substantial change in the circumstances and that there is no justification for the court to intervene.
Awawdeh’s name made headlines when the Islamic Jihad demanded his release as part of the conditions for the ceasefire that ended the IDF’s Operation Breaking Dawn.
While the Islamic Jihad claimed that Israel agreed to release both Awawdeh and Bassam Al-Saadi, the group’s leader in Judea and Samaria who was arrested before the start of the operation, Israeli leaders have denied the claim.