One of the released Palestinian prisoners last night was 25-year-old Raghad Salah Al Fanni, from Tulkarem in the West Bank, who had been held in an Israeli prison for 13 months without charge.
In the hours before her release her father Nashaat told The Telegraph that the family were overjoyed. “The situation was terrible, we were all just devastated all of the time,” Nashaat said from his home as he waited to pick his daughter up from Ofer prison.
He said her arrest, like that of so many others, was unjust. “She was just travelling to work, from Tulkarem to Ramallah – in a taxi as usual –  when they were stopped at an Israeli checkpoint and she was arrested,” Nashaat said. “That was it. No charge. No reason. Just administrative detention,” he said, referring to an Israeli charge where people can be held indefinitely on the suspicion that they might commit a future crime. “We could do nothing.”
Israel is estimated to be holding more than 2,000 Palestinians in administrative detention. Most of the 300 Palestinian prisoners who are eligible for release are aged 18 and under and largely convicted of minor offences such as stone-throwing or disturbing the peace. Many were swept up into arrest during waves of Israeli settler violence in the West Bank that caused widespread unrest. Some on the list, including women, were charged with attempted murder.
According to the list provided by the Israeli justice ministry of prisoners eligible for release in the exchange, Raghad had no detailed offences but was arrested under “national security reasons” under the belief that she is associated with The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.Â