Jailed Palestinian Militant Starts Hunger Strike

An Islamic militant serving multiple life sentences in an Israeli prison has declared an open-ended hunger in protest at his solitary confinement, a Palestinian prisoner support group said on Sunday.

The Ramallah-based Palestinian Prisoners' Club said that about 200 other Palestinians spread across several Israeli jails would fast in solidarity with former Hamas military leader Ibrahim Hamed, taking it in turns to each go without food for limited periods.

The club told AFP that high-profile inmates including Fatah commander Marwan Barghuti and Ahmed Saadat, secretary general of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, could join the rolling hunger strike.

Israel Prisons Service spokeswoman Sivan Weizman told AFP that by early Sunday afternoon Hamed had refused two meals.

She said, without elaborating, that he was placed in isolation three months ago "on suspicion of involvement in forbidden activity".

An Israeli military court in 2012 sentenced Hamed to multiple life sentences after convicting him of ordering the killing of dozens of Israelis and wounding hundreds.

Some 1,550 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel ended a hunger strike in May 2012, in exchange for a package of measures which would allow visits from relatives in Gaza and the transfer of detainees out of solitary confinement.