Palestinian Israa Jaabis Officially Released from Israeli Prison

Palestine – Palestinian prisoner Israa Jaabis finally arrived at her home in occupied East Jerusalem after being released from an Israeli prison, the Jerusalem-based Wadi Hilweh Information Center said on Sunday.

Israeli police imposed several restrictions including not celebrating her release and evacuating all journalists from her home so as not to cover the first moments of her release.

Jaabis spent seven years in Israeli prisons with a sentence of 11 years in prison. On October 11, 2015, she was on her way to home in Jerusalem when the gas cylinder in her car exploded and the car caught fire.

She suffered third-degree burns that scorched 60% of her body, including her face and hands. Israeli authorities accused Jaabis of wanting to carry out a "terror" attack, a charge she denied.

Jaabis was on a list of 39 Palestinian women and children scheduled to be released from Israeli prisons as part of a second wave of prisoner swap deals with the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.

Israel and Hamas exchanged 24 Israelis and foreigners for 39 Palestinians from Israeli jails on Friday, the first day of a four-day humanitarian pause. The second wave of prisoner swaps is nearing completion after the release of 17 Israelis and foreigners on Saturday morning.

Under the agreement, the hostages and prisoners will be released in stages over four days. Israel launched a massive military campaign in the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by Hamas on October 7.

Since then, Israel has killed at least 14,854 Palestinians, including 6,150 children and more than 4,000 women, according to health authorities in the enclave. The official death toll in Israel stands at 1,200. 

Israa Jaabis is a Palestinian woman now suffering from burns and charged with attempted murder after her car exploded near an Israeli checkpoint in 2015.

She was accused by Israel of attempted murder after blowing up her car at a checkpoint, a charge she denies. The burned were caused by an explosion inside the car due to a technical fault.

Damaged on the inside, physically burned, and in great pain, Jaabis said last week, in a letter dictated to his lawyer, that she did not receive adequate medical care from the Israeli Prison System (IPS).

She suffers from first and third-degree burns on 60 percent of his body, and relies on fellow prisoners to help him perform simple tasks, leaving him feeling "humiliated".

Eight of her fingers were amputated due to melting from the burns. She was unable to raise her arms fully because the skin of her armpits stuck together. Her right ear was almost non-existent and always had inflammation.                                    

And her nose has a gaping hole on one side; she breathes mostly through her mouth. She also suffers from a nervous breakdown, shock, and a severe psychological crisis. 

Car explosion

On October 10, 2015, Jaabis was moving furniture in his car to his home in the Jabal Al-Mukaber neighborhood in Jerusalem when, 500 meters from the al-Zayyim checkpoint in Jerusalem, he lost control of his vehicle.

The "Knife Intifada" or "October Uprising", characterized by individual attacks that ranged from stabbings, car rammings, and, to a lesser extent, shootings, mostly carried out by Palestinians in their teens and twenties who were not affiliated with political factions, began.

Israeli soldiers shouted to Jaabis to stop his car, which turned into an adjacent lane. Suddenly, there was the sound of an explosion inside the car.