‘Keffiyehs seized, left to die’: Inside the Palestine Action hunger strike
Four activists who joined a daring hunger strike are planning to take legal action against the United Kingdom prisons that allegedly mistreated them. London, United Kingdom – A month after being released on bail , pro-Palestine activists who participated in a months-long hunger strike in prison are planning on taking legal action over their alleged mistreatment.
On Wednesday, at a news conference where four of the activists spoke about life in jail and their lasting medical conditions, Lisa Minerva Luxx, a campaigner who supports the group, said the defendants are “seeking to take legal action against the prisons for their medical neglect”, adding, “legal action is due to take place”.
Eight young activists linked to the protest group Palestine Action began a rolling hunger strike in November that lasted until January. Qesser Zuhrah, 21, Teuta Hoxha, 30, Kamran Ahmed, 28, and 31-year-old Heba Muraisi were bailed in February after the High Court ruled that the proscription of Palestine Action was unlawful .
They had been held on remand for 15 months in connection with a raid on the Elbit Systems UK factory in Filton, near Bristol, on August 6, 2024. Heba Muraisi, who refused food for 73 days, told Al Jazeera she is still suffering from “neurological issues”. “My hair is still falling out in chunks, I can’t walk long distances without needing to take a break.
Physically and mentally, I’m still recovering. I’m still not there yet,” she said. She told the news conference that the treatment she faced in prison “only got worse” when the government proscribed Palestine Action as a “terror” group in July 2025.
Muraisi said she was physically assaulted to the point that the “wind was thrown out of me”, was regularly placed in solitary confinement, and had her keffiyeh confiscated – so she instead used a pillowcase as a headscarf while praying. During her detention, Muraisi was transferred to a jail in northern England, much further from Bronzefield prison near her loved ones.
Prison authorities “refused to tell me where I was going,” she said. “My mother, who is unwell, couldn’t visit for five months.” She claimed that she was not provided with electrolytes during her hunger strike “and only received vitamins after 30 days”. Others, held at different prisons, spoke of similar patterns of alleged mistreatment.
Through tears and wearing a grey sweatsuit that resembled her prison gear – and that of Palestinians detained by Israel – Qesser Zuhrah said, “I was 19 when I was kidnapped from my home by counterterrorism police in a very violent raid.” “For the entirety of my imprisonment, I was subject to a calculated regime of isolation, blocked from making any friends, especially other young people and Muslims,” she said.
“One Muslim woman I met [was told by a guard that] there are dangerous people here and that she needs to be moved away from me.” Zuhrah added that “multiple periods of prolonged confinement and isolation in my cell without reason” made her feel “like a ghost of myself”.
She said that one day, after two prisoners had died in a week, she asked the guards to unlock the cell of a claustrophobic inmate who was suffering from suicidal thoughts. “They responded by assaulting me,” she said.
“Female guards grabbed my arms, exposed my body, dragged me through the landing and up a metal staircase, and threw me into my cell against the metal bed frame.” Zuhrah refused food for almost 50 days as part of the hunger strike, pushing her body to the limits.
Like the other activists, she was hospitalised during this period. “Our prisons mistreated us in the most elaborate ways, in order to teach us that our bodies don’t belong to us,” she said, claiming that she was also denied electrolytes and received vitamins after only 30 days.
Guards “tried to tempt me with food”, she said, alleging “cruel tactics” that impacted her health. “On the 45th or 46th day, they left me paralysed with muscle wastage on my cell floor for 22 h…