RAMALLAH, (Palestine Foundation Information Center), Israeli occupation forces (IOF) continue to target elected members of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) in the West Bank, with 10 lawmakers currently held in Israeli prisons, despite the council having been effectively suspended for years by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
Among the detainees are two of the longest-held Palestinian political prisoners: Marwan Barghouti and Ahmad Saadat, both serving life sentences. The oldest detainee is Jerusalem lawmaker Mohammad Abu Tir, 75.
Abu Tir was rearrested on November 24, 2025, after the IOF raided his home in Dar Salah, near Bethlehem. He is among several Jerusalem lawmakers whose residency IDs were revoked in 2006 and who have since faced repeated arrests and forced removals from the city.
He has spent nearly half his life in Israeli detention and is currently held in harsh conditions in an underground section of Nitzan prison in Ramla under a four-month administrative detention order.
On September 25, 2025, the IOF arrested lawmaker Yasser Mansour from his home in Nablus. Another PLC member, Nasser Abdul Jawad, 57, was detained on August 21, 2025, from Deir Ballut, west of Salfit. Abdul Jawad, an academic and political figure, has spent around 20 years in Israeli prisons.
Israeli forces also arrested lawmaker Anwar Zaboun, 58, from Bethlehem on August 17, 2025. Husni al-Bourini was detained in October 2024 after a raid on his home in Asira al-Shamaliya in Nablus, while Khaled Suleiman was arrested in Jenin in August 2024.
Lawmaker Mohammad Jamal al-Natsheh, 68, was detained in Al-Khalil in March 2025 and is considered one of the most serious medical cases in Israeli custody.
Senior Hamas figure and PLC member Sheikh Hassan Yousef, 73, was rearrested in October 2023. A prominent West Bank leader and one of the Marj al-Zohour deportees in 1992, he won his parliamentary seat while imprisoned and has spent more than 27 years in Israeli jails.
Rights groups say the detention of elected lawmakers lacks legal basis, constitutes political retaliation, and represents a grave violation of international law, democratic norms, and Palestinian self-governance.
