21-year-old Palestinian prisoner Ahmad Manasra was arrested for attempted murder at the age of 13. An amendment to the 2016 Counter-Terrorism Law allowed the parole committee to determine retroactively that Ahmad’s actions, even as a minor, constituted a “terror act”, therefore making him ineligible for early release, despite his deteriorating medical condition, which requires immediate medical attention outside of prison.
Adalah's appeal to the Supreme court against a lower court's decision to deny him early release was rejected.
Manasra's case exemplifies the inhumane conditions imposed on Palestinian prisoners, including minors, held in Israeli jails, whose very lives are at stake, and demonstrates how Israel creates separate legal mechanisms that are applied only to Palestinians.
Manasra has been held in solitary confinement for almost a year and a half, despite being diagnosed with schizophrenia, and in March 2023,
the Court extended his solitary confinement for an additional six months. Relying on an article in the counter terrorism law, Israel also seized deposits Manasra's family made into his canteen account (which enables him to purchase essential food items in prison), raided his family's home and confiscated their possessions. The article stipulates that Israel can confiscate property from Palestinian prisoners as a punishment for being paid allowances by the Palestinian Authority.
An online campaign to free Manasra has gathered momentum and an
online petition to release him gained around half a million signatories, while
UN experts have also urged Israel to immediately release him, stating that the "ill-defined and overly broad Counter-Terrorism Law has led to far too many instances of arbitrariness and abuse", and that Manasra's case "is yet another morally and legally unjustifiable consequence of the Law".