After spending years in prison, Palestinian prisoner dies three months following his release

A Palestinian man who had been detained for 19 years in an Israeli prison passed away a few months after he was released, the Palestinian Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society announced on Thursday.

Moatasem Taleb Raddad, 43, from the town of Seida in the West Bank, passed away on Thursday evening in a hospital in Cairo, Egypt, after a long battle with cancer. 

Raddad was exiled to Egypt after he was released as part of a prisoner exchange agreement in January between the Israeli government and Hamas. He had been in prison since 2006 and was among the most seriously ill of the Palestinian prisoners.

He was transferred to a hospital in Egypt after his release, but his condition had already reached a critical stage, leading to his death just three months later.

Raddad suffered injuries from shrapnel during his imprisonment and subsequently developed several chronic and life-threatening health concerns, such as severe intestinal inflammation, chronic internal bleeding, hypertension, respiratory issues, an irregular heartbeat, and intense pain in his back and joints. His health deteriorated while he was in prison due to medical neglect and the poor conditions he experienced in Israeli jails such as Ofer Prison, according to Palestinian news reports.