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These people were charged with escaping from the heavily guarded Gilbo Prison last month, and five others were accused of helping them.
Six re-captured Palestinian political prisoners who escaped from a heavily guarded Israeli prison last month were formally indicted on Sunday.
The prosecutor’s statement stated that these people were accused of escaping from Gilboa prison in northern Israel, while the other five were accused of assisting them.
The detainees — five from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and one belonging to an armed branch of the Palestinian Authority’s Fatah faction — have been serving sentences, including life imprisonment.
The four were arrested between 1996 and 2006 and were convicted of attacking Israeli army and civilian targets.
According to the complaint, at the end of 2020, they began to dig tunnels under the sinks in the cell toilets.
The indictment said: “The defendants work in shifts every day to prevent them from being caught, while using temporary digging tools.”
One of the prisoners, 46-year-old Mahmoud Abdullah al-Ardah, said that after he was recaptured, he used a spoon, a plate, and even the handle of a kettle to dig a tunnel.
The indictment stated that as of September 5, the 30-meter-long (98-foot) tunnel had been completed, and the tunnel extended beyond the prison walls. All these people fled that night.
These six people were hailed by the Palestinians as heroes in the nation-building struggle and were arrested in batches during a raid in Israel in September.
In addition to al-Ardah-a member of the Islamic Jihad and a so-called prison escape planner-the inmates included 45-year-old Zakaria Zubeidi, who led the Fatah armed forces in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin in the north.
The other four are 35-year-old Ayham Nayef Kamanji, 26-year-old Munadel Infaat, 49-year-old Yaqoub Mahmoud Qadri and 40-year-old Mohammad al-Ardah.
Israel has begun investigating how they made a bold escape.
Several men’s lawyers previously told Al Jazeera that the prisoners were temporarily barred from meeting their lawyers under the order of the Israeli intelligence service.
The lawyer also said that at least one Palestinian last month said he was suffering from the physical and mental torture of Israeli interrogators.
Israel currently holds 4,650 Palestinians in various prison facilities. According to data released by the rights organization Addameer, at least 200 people are children and 520 people are administrative detainees—meaning they are being held without charge or trial.
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