Today marks the anniversary of the start of the 1981 Long Kesh hunger strike against the criminalisation of republican policical prisoners. On this day 32 years ago Bobby Sands first began to refuse food, and wrote, prophetically, that he was “standing on the threshold of another trembling world. May God have mercy on my soul.”

Another prisoner who has followed the same path is Samer Issawi, a 34 year old political activist and member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, who has been on hunger strike for over 200 days. He is now close to death. The following account is by éirígí.