Prisoners end protest in Israel
Palestinian inmates call off a hunger strike after reaching a deal over family visits.
TEL AVIV — Hundreds of Palestinians jailed in Israeli prisons ended a 6-week-old hunger strike Saturday that raised tensions with Israel while marking the reemergence 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 1,600 prisoners during the last month, making it the largest such prisoner demonstration in recent memory.
The hunger strike stirred grass-roots solidarity demonstrations throughout the West Bank and even garnered expressions of support from the rival Islamic faction Hamas. It ratcheted up popular pressure on Abbas during the visit of President Trump to the West Bank city of Bethlehem on Tuesday.
The hunger strike ended a day after the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, a period of daily fasting that could have further endangered the health of the participants.
A death among the protesting prisoners was likely to have fanned demonstrations and risked turmoil with Israeli forces in the West Bank.
Hundreds of Palestinians clapped and danced to festive music in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Saturday as leaders of the prisoners’ campaign declared that the striking inmates had “prevailed” over Israel by forcing the prison authorities to negotiate on the conditions for about 6,300 Palestinians in Israeli jails.
After talks involving Israel, the prisoner leadership and the International Committee of the Red Cross, the sides agreed to increase the frequency of family visits for the inmates.
“This is an important step towards full respect of the rights of Palestinian prisoners under international law,” the Free Marwan Barghouti campaign said in a statement.
Nickolay Mladenov, the United Nations special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, welcomed the agreement and, in a statement, urged the sides to “avoid similar heightened tensions in the future.”
A spokeswoman for the Israel Prison Service confirmed the agreement but denied the strike had forced negotiations over conditions in the jails with the prisoner representatives.
According to the prison service, nearly 1,600 Palestinians prisoners participated at some point during the strike.
By the end, 850 were still participating.
Palestinian political analysts said the strike was a boost for Barghouti, who is seen as the top candidate to succeed Abbas at a time of widespread speculation about who will take the place of the 82-year-old Palestinian Authority president.
The strike began in mid-April, when Barghouti penned an op-ed in the New York Times to protest “ill treatment of Palestinian prisoners.”
Midway through the hunger strike, Israeli authorities made public a video purporting to show Barghouti in his prison cell eating a candy bar.
Palestinians challenged the authenticity of the video, which actually helped boost support for Barghouti and the hunger strikers.
Barghouti, who was jailed by Israel in 2002 at the height of a campaign of Palestinian suicide bombings and shooting attacks in Israeli cities, is seen by some as a potential peacemaker because of grass-roots appeal among Palestinians and his support for negotiations with Israel.
In 2004, he was convicted by a Tel Aviv district court of murder in three attacks that left five people dead. He was also convicted of being a member of a terrorist group. Years of opinion polls show him as the most popular Palestinian politician.
Though the Palestinian Authority backed the strike, the prisoners’ demonstration put Abbas in an awkward position among Palestinians, many of whom believed that his government didn’t do enough to support the strike.
As Abbas met with President Trump, Palestinians observed a commercial strike and held public demonstrations in solidarity with the prisoners.
A public opinion survey this month by the Arab World for Research and Development group found that two-thirds of respondents said they were dissatisfied with Abbas’ response to the strike.
“There is a narrative being drawn up that this is a victory, so it is a victory,” said Daoud Kuttab, a Palestinian political analyst based in Amman, Jordan. “There is a perception this is a victory for the prisoners, and for Marwan [Barghouti], because he embarked on a strike the Palestinian Authority wasn’t that excited about.”