Khader Adnan was a long-time Palestinian Arab activist, and at one point a spokesman for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Arrested many times, Mr Adnan’s weapon of choice in detention was the hunger strike. His first hunger strike, ten days long, occurred in 2000, when he was locked up not by the Israelis, but the Palestinian National Authority. In 2011, he began another hunger strike, one which lasted 66 days. In 2015, he undertook a 56-day hunger strike, which resulted in Israel releasing him.

In spite of the agreement to end his first hunger strike (see above), Adnan was arrested again on 8 July 2014, at the beginning of the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, and has been held in detention ever since, beginning his second hunger strike on 5 May 2015. The government of Israel was seemingly determined to break Adnan’s hunger strike using force-feeding techniques similar to those used by the USA in its Guantanamo Bay prison camp. Israeli Minister of Public Security Gilad Erdan was quoted as saying “Security prisoners are interested in turning hunger strikes into a new kind of suicide attack that would threaten the State of Israel. We cannot allow anyone to threaten us and we will not allow prisoners to die in our prisons.” However, the Israeli Medical Society and various human rights groups were deploring this planned course of action by Israel, with the Medical Society issuing orders to Israeli doctors to not participate in any planned forced feedings except under certain limited circumstances not applicable to Adnan at this point in time.

Palestinian Khader Adnan, center, is greeted by Palestinians after his release from an Israeli prison in the West Bank village of Arrabeh near Jenin on July 12, 2015. Photo by Majdi Mohammed/AP, via CNN. Click to enlarge.

Adnan was again detained without charge in 2015 and again started a hunger strike on 4 May that lasted 56 days until Israel agreed to release him in July. He was arrested again in 2017 and again immediately began a hunger strike that lasted 58 days. Arrested once more in 2021 after being detained at an Israeli checkpoint, and he again went on hunger strike in protest, this strike lasting 25 days.

You can see how Mr Adnan was greeted by the Palestinians after his release. He was never going to be anything other that a pain in the ass for Israel.

Well, he was arrested again on February 5, 2023, and began another hunger strike, which would be his last: he died on May 2^nd, after 87 days. Some in the Israeli media are upset about that:

Khader Adnan’s death in prison: A preventable crisis – opinion

A number of democratic countries permit force-feeding to rescue the life of a fasting prisoner. Israel could have saved Khader Adnan’s life.

By Shimon Glick | Thursday, May 11, 2023 | 1:01 AM Jerusalem Time

Following a series of security events which we recently faced, it is incumbent upon us to do some serious examination, without the involvement of political considerations. The events began with the death of a hunger-striking prisoner, Khader Adnan, and then deteriorated in an almost predictable manner. But with some different behavior on our part, much of the crisis could have been avoided.

Why was the death of Adnan not prevented by force-feeding him when his health deteriorated seriously? The answer is that the Israel Medical Association accepts the position of the World Medical Association that it is forbidden to force-feed a hunger-striking protesting prisoner.

Such a step is regarded as a violation of the autonomy of the prisoner. But it is important to be aware that this view is far from a unanimous international consensus and from Israeli court decisions.

Dr Glick, a professor emeritus of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, continues to note the history and precedence of force-feeding a hunger-striking prisoner in Israel.

Let us think how much of what’s been occurring recently we would have been spared if we would have saved the life of Adnan, in the spirit of Jewish culture and without violating ethical norms.

While I hesitate to go all-out “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?“, none of the references I have found have stated that Israel ever broke one of Mr Adnan’s hunger strikes via force-feeding, but he did win some concessions in his various attempts. I have to ask: did the Israelis finally say to themselves, “if he wishes to kill himself, let him”? Israel is a liberal democracy, the only one in the Middle East, and Dr Glick expresses that.

But Mr Adnan found a weapon he could apparently tolerate, better than most, and used it to his political advantage. By not force-feeding him, by letting him starve himself to death, Israel rid itself of a turbulent problem.

Dr Glick is wrong: force-feeding Mr Adnan, if they had “saved the life of Adnan,” the Palestinians would still hate the Israelis, and Hamas and their ilk would have continued to occasionally shoot rockets into Israel proper, and launch the occasional terror attack. The Arabs were given to violence and terror against Jews migrating to the Levant even when they were few in number, well before the re-establishment of Israel, well before World War II and the shoah, really for the entire 20^th century.

Mr Adnan has gone to his eternal reward, and Israelis will not miss him.