A few years after he had left Israeli jails following a prisoner swap deal struck between the Palestinian resistance and the Israeli occupation authorities the health of leukemia-stricken ex-prisoner Tareq Ezzedine has taken a turn for the worse.
With a pale face yellowish lips and exhausted body Ezzedine lies on a bed at Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi Hospital in the blockaded Gaza Strip in a painful experience not so much dissimilar to the one he suffered behind prison bars.
Tareq Ezzedine a member of the Quds resistance brigades in Jenin province was kidnapped by the Israeli occupation forces in 2002 and sent to jail on charges of involvement in anti-occupation attacks that led to the death of 70 Israeli settlers. He was released in the historic Wafa al-Ahrar prisoner swap deal. His brother Shahed is still locked up in Israeli dungeons.
Ezzedine served as a member of the management board at Sawt al-Asra radio station in Gaza which speaks up for Palestinian prisoners and their families in the besieged enclave.
His family and friends appealed to the concerned authorities to grant him urgent medical transfer outside of Gaza due to his exacerbated health condition after he caught leukemia—cancer of the body’s blood-forming tissues including the bone marrow and the lymphatic system. It is a type of cancer that usually begins in the bone marrow and results in high numbers of abnormal white blood cells. These white blood cells are not fully developed and are called blasts or leukemia cells.
Ezzedine has been hospitalized at Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi Hospital in Gaza. He has not received proper therapy for weeks.
The family has sounded the alarm over the deteriorating health condition of their son whom they said has been banned by the occupation authorities from entering Occupied Jerusalem and the West Bank. They added that the type of therapy Ezzedine needs is not available in Gaza’s poorly-equipped hospitals and that he needs urgent access to Egypt via Rafah border-crossing.
“Save Tareq before it is too late” calls have been launched by his friends colleagues and family members pushing for urgent steps to save the ex-prisoner without further delay.
