Detainees in Holot prison launch protest ahead of World Refugee Day
Hundreds of detainees rally outside detention facility, located in one southern Israel's most remote corners.
By BEN HARTMANDETAINEES PASS the time at the Holot detention facility in the western Negev.(photo credit: BEN HARTMAN)
World Refugee Day will be marked in cities across the world on Friday, while in Israel, African asylum seekers in the Holot Negev detention center were began on Thursday what they said was a peaceful protest to object to their detention.In a press release on Thursday, the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants quotes some of the 2,300 migrants detained in the facility as saying that Holot "is illegal because it violates our rights to liberty, freedom and also our rights to life which are considered a fundamental human right."Protests have broken out on a number of occasions over recent months at the facility, and in this new round, detainees have vowed to refuse to sign in at Holot during the three daily check ins.In the statement, they listed their demands as greater medical treatment for detainees, the release of migrant detainees who have been jailed for over 2 years, and for the state of Israel to hand over their cases to the United Nations High Committee for Refugees.On Thursday, a few hundred detainees rallied outside the main gate of the facility, located in one of the most remote corners of southern Israel.
