RAMALLAH
Two hundred Palestinian prisoners started on Thursday an indefinite hunger strike to protest Israel's administrative detention policy, a rights lawyer said.
"Detainees refused food on Thursday and declared a hunger strike," Jawab Boules, a lawyer with the Ramallah-based Palestinian Prisoners Club, told Anadolu Agency.
"Some administrative prisoners have been in jail for years without trial," Boules said. "Prisons have become like their homes."
Administrative detention is an Israeli policy under which Palestinians are held without trial, usually for security reasons.
An administrative detention order ranges from one to 6 months and can be extended till up to five years by an Israeli military court.
Boules accused Israeli authorities of violating the terms of an Egypt-sponsored deal that ended a 2012 hunger strike by Palestinian prisoners, under which Israel had pledged not to renew the administrative detention of any prisoner without legal justification.
Israeli officials were not available for comment.
Around 5,000 Palestinians languish in some 22 Israeli prisons and detentions, according to a recent report by the Prisoners Centre for Studies and Research, a Palestinian NGO.
They include 200 minors and 19 women, the report said.
By Qais Abu Samra
englishnews@aa.com.tr
