Further evidence is emerging of the wide-reaching activities of the late Abdallah Aljamal, the Palestinian journalist who in his spare time served also as the host/jailer for three of the four kidnapped Israeli hostages freed in an Israeli special forces operation in Gaza last week. Aljamal, along with his wife Fatima and father Ahmed, was killed when Israeli forces entered their apartment, where the hostages were being held, in the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza. The three rescued hostages held by the Aljamals are Shlomi Ziv, Almog Meir Jan, and Andrey Kozlov.
In addition to his service assisting the Hamas authorities in Gaza in the incarceration of civilian abductees, Aljamal was employed as a spokesman for the Gaza Labor Ministry. He also found time in his busy schedule to work as a journalist, penning a long list of articles for the US-based Palestine Chronicle newspaper, as well as a co-authored piece for Al-Jazeera.
Aljamal also found time in his busy schedule to work as a journalist, penning a long list of articles for the U.S.-based Palestine Chronicle newspaper, as well as a co-authored piece for Al-Jazeera.
But Aljamal’s activities don’t appear to have stopped there. Evidence has also emerged, ironically, that in addition to holding (Israeli) prisoners, Aljamal was also an activist for the rights of Palestinians incarcerated for terrorist offences. This element of his activities brought Aljamal into contact with internationally known figures.
For example, a look at Aljamal’s Facebook page reveals an entry dated May 23rd, 2023, which shows him taking part in what he describes as ‘an international meeting via Zoom, which brought together freed Palestinian prisoners with Irish freed prisoners and activists, most notably the freed prisoner Danny Morrison, one of the most prominent leaders of the Irish experience in hunger strikes during the occupation.’ The Gazan journalist/activist continues that the meeting was held to ‘galvanise the issue of the hunger strike, and expose the occupation’s crimes against prisoners.’
Danny Morrison, a former member of the terrorist Provisional IRA, was director of publicity for Sinn Fein, the political wing of the movement, in the 1980s.
Aljamal’s May 23rd Facebook entry ends, possibly slightly self-importantly, with the declaration that ‘I have long been convinced of the necessity of paying attention to the international public and forming a global public opinion that supports and champions the Palestinian cause.’
The meeting here described by Abdallah Aljamal was reported on by Donia Al Watan, a Palestinian online news publication. According to this publication, the meeting was organized by the Istanbul based Palestinian Dialogue Group. Donia Al Watan further details that ‘the meeting took place at the ‘headquarters of the Commission for Prisoners and Ex-Detainees Affairs in Gaza City, with the participation of the liberated prisoner Hassan Quneita’, and ‘the Irish liberated prisoner Danny Morrison, one of the most prominent leaders of the Irish experience in hunger strike during the occupation.’
Donia Al Watan goes on to note that the meeting opened with a speech by Morrison, in which he ‘praised the steadfastness of the Palestinian prisoners’, and expressed his solidarity and that of the ‘free people of the world’ for the Palestinian prisoners on hunger strike.’
The ‘Commission for Prisoners and ex-detainees Affairs,’ it is worth noting, is not a Hamas body. Rather, it is maintained by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, but operates also in cooperation with the Hamas authority in Gaza.
The ‘Commission for Prisoners and ex-detainees Affairs,’ it is worth noting, is not a Hamas body. Rather, it is maintained by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, but operates also in cooperation with the Hamas authority in Gaza.
The meeting documented by Abdallah Aljamal and Donia Al Watan shows the extent to which the Islamist Gaza authority which carried out the massacres of October 7, 2023, managed nevertheless to make international connections and to be perceived as legitimate by figures connected to prominent European political movements. Morrison’s own views on the events of October 7 are not known.
Regarding the ill-fated Abdallah Aljamal, emergent evidence of the conditions faced by the civilians kidnapped by he and his colleagues indicates that his evident concern for the well being of the incarcerated did not extend to those who he himself was holding captive.
According to Dr. Itai Pessah of Sheba Medical Center outside Tel Aviv, who is supervising the recovery of the four rescued Israeli hostages, the three men held by Aljamal were ‘beaten regularly’ during their captivity, suffered ‘almost daily abuse’ and show signs of malnutrition and muscle wastage. Shlomi Ziv, one of the hostages held by the Abujamals told Israel Channel 13 news that the men were made to read the Quran each day and to take part in Islamic prayer.
Abdallah Aljamal’s last article for the Palestine Chronicle, published on June 3, was entitled ‘My House will Always be Open.’ A cynic might observe that this observation turned out to be more true than Aljamal knew. The irony of the prisoners’ rights activist who was simultaneously holding and abusing prisoners of his own, meanwhile, is likely to remain as one of the more curious monuments to the inversion of all coherent codes of ethics by the Gaza Islamists and their many supporters in the west, both before and in the course of the current war.
