'They were trying to dehumanise me': Palestine Action hunger strikers allege mistreatment in prison
Kamran Ahmed suffers from stabbing chest pains and shortness of breath.
“Even right now, when I'm speaking, it feels like there's a string pulling on the right side of my chest,” the former prisoner told Middle East Eye.
“I was in hospital two days ago because the chest pains were becoming unbearable.”
Ahmed is only 28 years old. But his health has taken a nosedive since he concluded a 66-day hunger strike in HMP Pentonville in London.
He is one of eight prisoners linked to the direct action group Palestine Action who refused food in protest, during a 15-month period of pre-trial detention.
They were remanded in connection with an alleged break-in at a factory owned by Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems near Bristol in August 2024. Their detention exceeded the UK's standard pre-trial custodial time limit of six months.
In July 2025, months into their detention, the Labour government proscribed Palestine Action, a move deemed unlawful by England's High Court.
First news conference since release
On Wednesday, four of the hunger strikers – Ahmed, Qesser Zuhrah, 21, Teuta Hoxha, 30, and Heba Muraisi, 31 – spoke to journalists for the first time since they were granted bail in February, after some of the charges against them were dropped.
Maddy Norman, another Palestine Action-linked prisoner recently released on bail, was also at the news conference.
They appeared subdued but resolute. Zuhrah was tearful, dressed in her grey prison-issue tracksuit. Hoxha warned reporters that, due to the brain fog she has been experiencing in the aftermath of her strike, "My mind is not operating as it should be. It's not as sharp as it was."
Lisa Minerva Luxx, spokesperson for a campaign supporting the group, told journalists that the former prisoners are seeking legal action against the prisons they were held in over their "medical neglect”.
In the last weeks of his strike, tests showed that Ahmed’s heart muscle had shrunk, prompting medical professionals to warn he was facing a “death risk”.
He recalled one conversation with a prison nurse, who he said told him that she didn’t believe he would wake up in the morning.
Ahmed was hospitalised multiple times during his hunger strike. Each time, his family were not notified or able to contact him.
'The doctors had made multiple attempts to tell the officers, "I think you need to actually remove the cuffs or at least loosen them"'
– Kamran Ahmed
Throughout each hospitalisation, he was shackled to a prison officer, even while showering. During his first time in hospital, he said, the cuffs were so tight that his wrists were purple and swollen for days after he was discharged back to prison.
“The doctors had made multiple attempts to tell the officers, 'I think you need to actually remove the cuffs or at least loosen them,'” Ahmed told MEE.
He recalled that the prison officers did not give him an explanation for the treatment, beyond citing it as stemming from “a top-down decision”.
MEE previously spoke to medical professionals who raised concerns about the shackling of hospitalised prisoners, and emphasised that restraints should only be used in "exceptional circumstances".
Ahmed said that during one visit, his shoes were taken away and he was left to walk in socks across a urine-soaked shared toilet floor.
He returned to the prison without his shoes.
“They were trying to dehumanise me,” Ahmed said.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: "All individuals were managed in line with longstanding policy while in prison. This includes regular checks by medical professionals, heart monitoring and blood tests, and support to help them eat and drink again. If deemed appropriate by healthcare teams, prisoners were taken to hospital".
'Chained to an officer like a dog'
Hoxha, Muraisi and Zuhrah, who were held in different prisons, reported similar treatment.
Hoxha, who was imprisoned at HMP Bronzefield in Surrey, said she was “chained to an officer like a dog” when hospitalised, even while using the toilet.
'I was starting to feel like a ghost of myself because I could barely smile any more, and a silence was setting inside of me'
– Qesser Zuhrah
Zuhrah, who was also held at Bronzefield and just 19 at the time of her arrest, said she was left immobile on her cell floor for 22 hours with worsening chest pains, 40 days into her hunger strike.
MEE previously reported that the prison refused her repeated pleas for an ambulance.
Zuhrah described how, throughout that night, guards watched her through her open cell door.
“The guards took turns staring at me, watching and waiting for either my soul to leave my body or my dignity to collapse and for me to end my hunger strike,” she said.
“They left me to die on my cell floor, or at least believe that they would. This was one of the scariest and hardest moments of my life."
Solitary confinement
Zuhrah described how, throughout her imprisonment, she was subjected to “multiple periods of prolonged confinement and isolation in my cell without reason”.
She said that, from the moment she entered the prison, the guards tried to segregate her from other inmates, particularly from other young people and Muslim prisoners.
“I was starting to feel like a ghost of myself because I could barely smile any more, and a silence was setting inside of me," she said.
'There was a second guard there who was female, who should have been cuffed to me, but refused to swap with the male guard'
– Heba Muraisi
Zuhrah said that the prison guards “made sure I never forgot the threat of violence. They talked to me only by shouting, boots running, sleeves rolling and body cams beeping on”.
She highlighted one incident in which she said she begged prison guards to temporarily release a distressed inmate, who was severely claustrophobic and a suicidal prisoner, from their cell. Zuhrah said the guards responded by "assaulting” her.
“They dragged me through the landing and up a metal staircase and then threw me into my cell against the metal bed frame."
While in hospital and hooked onto an IV drip, Zuhrah recalled that the officer she was chained to complained that she "missed using force". Her male colleague then turned to Zuhrah and instructed her to "act up" so she "could use force".
Muraisi, who was held at HMP Bronzefield and then transferred to HMP New Hall in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, said that on one occasion she was "violently cuffed and dragged across the prison by six guards", so aggressively that she "had the wind knocked out" of her.
She was then thrown into solitary confinement, and forced to use a pillowcase to cover her head while praying, as the guards had removed her keffiyeh and refused to give her a head scarf.
MEE has approached HMP Bronzefield for comment.
Muraisi launched her hunger strike after she was transferred to HMP New Hall, which she said was so far away that her sick mother was not able to visit her for almost five months.
She, like the other prisoners, reported medical neglect in prison, saying she was denied electrolytes and was only given vitamins 30 days into her hunger strike.
Muraisi said that, when she was taken to hospital for refeeding – a process by which nutrients are administered to restore body weight – she was shackled to a male officer who instructed her to change out of her clothes.
"There was a second guard there who was female, who should have been cuffed to me, but refused to swap with the male guard," Muraisi said, adding that the treatment forced her to halt her refeeding process early and return to hospital against medical advice.
The eight inmates ended their hunger strike in December, claiming victory after the government decided not to award a multi-billion-pound contract to the UK subsidiary of Elbit Systems.
Muraisi, Ahmed, Hoxha and Zuhrah are part of a group of detainees known as the "Filton 24". All were held on remand on charges of aggravated burglary, violent disorder and criminal damage in connection with the alleged break-in at an Elbit Systems factory near Bristol in August 2024.
In February, after six of the defendants were acquitted of aggravated burglary, the same charge was dropped against 18 others. Twenty-three of the defendants were released on bail, while Samuel Corner – who additionally faces charges of causing grievous bodily harm – remains on remand.
Four other hunger strikers, all facing charges connected to a separate break-in at RAF Brize Norton air base in July 2025, remain in prison.
This article was sourced from Middle East Eye.
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