Tel Aviv: Hundreds of Palestinians jailed in Israeli prisons ended a six-week-old hunger strike on Saturday that marked the re-emergence of a popular Palestinian politician serving multiple life terms for murder.
Led by Marwan Barghouti, a militant from the ruling Fatah party and a political rival to Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas, the strike included nearly 1600 prisoners during the last month, making it the largest such prisoner demonstration in recent memory.
The hunger strike stirred grassroots solidarity demonstrations throughout the Israeli-occupied West Bank and even garnered expressions of support from Fatah’s main political rival, the Islamist movement Hamas. It ratcheted up popular pressure on Abbas during the visit of US President Donald Trump to the West Bank city of Bethlehem on May 23.
The end of the hunger strike comes on the eve of the Muslim observance of the holy month of Ramadan, a period of daily fasting which could have further endangered the health of the participants.
Read the full article by Joshua Mitnick at The Sydney Morning Herald.