Global ‘Free Marwan’ campaign calls for Palestinian political leader’s release | Palestine
As negotiations continue in the context of the current Gaza ceasefire, a global campaign is underway to secure the release of Palestinian prisoner Marwan Barghouti, seen by many as the best hope of leading a future Palestinian state.
The campaign is being run by Barghouti’s family, who live in the West Bank, with support from UK civil society, He is trying to put the 66-year-old man’s fate at the center of the next phase of the ceasefire.
Consecutive opinion polls show him as the most popular Palestinian politician in Gaza and the West Bank.
Murals reading Free Marwan, coordinated by Calum Hall, founder of creative consultancy and arts platform Creative Debuts, have begun appearing in London, and a massive public art installation has emerged in the village of Kobar near Ramallah.
A letter calling for the release of a number of political and cultural figures is expected to be published next week.
Barghouti has been imprisoned by Israel for more than 20 years after being convicted of planning attacks that killed five civilians. The hearing was as follows: criticized as deeply flawed By the Inter-Parliamentary Union, an international organization.
Despite intense pressure from Hamas and Gulf states, Israel refused to release him as part of a large-scale prisoner exchange that took place during a ceasefire on October 13. At one point, Donald Trump admitted that he, too, considered pressing for his release.
Barghouti, a member of Hamas’ arch-rival Fatah party, is an advocate of the two-state solution. Many people think that Israel refused to release him because they knew he would be an effective spokesman for the Palestinian cause.
Barghouti is frequently held in solitary confinement without access to his family and is alleged to have suffered four major beatings in prison since 2023, but if released he is said to still be physically and mentally capable of becoming an effective political leader.
He hasn’t seen his family in three years, and his lawyers have seen him five times in two years. The International Committee of the Red Cross was banned from seeing him, in violation of international law.
He was recently subjected to videotaped taunts and threats of execution by Israeli national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. The Knesset is considering a new bill supported by Ben-Gvir that would allow the death penalty to be imposed on those found guilty of nationalist-motivated murder.
Barghouti, a pillar of Fatah and the Palestine Liberation Organization but who was imprisoned while Yasser Arafat was still in office, is thought to be able to regain the credibility of both movements, which had been weakened by the long rule of current president Mahmoud Abbas.
In 2004, an Israeli court sentenced Barghouti to five life terms plus 40 years in prison for allegedly helping plan deadly attacks during the second intifada.
His wife, Fadwa Barghouti, gave her first interviews to the Israeli press in an attempt to start changing Israeli public opinion. He emphasized that his wife “sees the two-state solution as the way to progress and live in peace.”
His son Arap Barghouti said his father “represented hope for Palestinians at a time when there were efforts to silence him and make him forget.”
He added: “Seeing people around the world chanting his name gives me hope. I wish our family’s experience was unique, but thousands of Palestinian families experience the same pain.”
“Honoring him in this way is not only a call for his freedom, but also a call for the release of all Palestinian prisoners and a stand for justice for every family still waiting.”
