Hebron - Al Jazeera Net

The Israeli occupation authorities released on Wednesday evening the Palestinian prisoner, Ali Salhab, after spending 18 years in its prisons.

Despite the difficulties that accompanied the last hours of his arrest, a liberating public reception was held for the liberated prisoner in the streets of the city of Hebron, and masked men from the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades fired bullets in the air in celebration of his freedom.

The effects of the prison were evident on the released prisoner, as he left the prison with a white beard, even though he was 35 years old.

How was he arrested?
Ali Salhab was injured in 2002 after the occupation forces bombed a military group affiliated with the Fatah movement in Wadi Al-Herriya, and while two of his comrades were martyred, he was wanted by the occupation forces.

He was arrested on July 22, 2002, in an ambush by the occupation forces after he was chased in the Bethlehem area.

During his arrest, Salhab moved between different prisons, and was supposed to release him from the Negev desert prison (southern Palestine), but the occupation intelligence subjected him to interrogation three hours before his release near the Etzion camp (south of Bethlehem).

During his detention, he suffered from medical negligence, despite his need for treatment as a result of a second injury he had suffered during a clash with the occupation forces after the martyrdom of the commander-in-chief of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, Marwan Zalloum.

Despite the difficulty of imprisonment and medical neglect, Salhab received a high school diploma and continued his university studies at Al-Quds Open University.

It is noteworthy that the Israeli prisons are inhabited by about six thousand Palestinian prisoners, 56 of whom have been arrested for more than twenty years, and 26 prisoners who have been in detention since before the Oslo Agreement signed in 1993 between the Palestine Liberation Organization and Israel.