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Palestinian detainee ends hunger strike: report

Xinhua, August 20, 2015 Adjust font size:

The high-profile Palestinian prisoner, Mohammad Allan, who has been hunger striking for 64 days in protest of his arrest without trial, ended the strike on Wednesday night, local media reported.

Allan's lawyer said that Allan ended his fast after Israel's top court ordered to temporarily freeze his administrative detention, a measure allowing Israel to hold detainees indefinitely without charging them or allowing them to stand to trial.

Israel's Supreme Court has ruled that Allan will have to stay in hospital due to his medical condition while the court decides on his future. He is currently held at the Barzilai hospital in southern Israel in a "very critical" condition, according to the hospital spokeswoman.

The lawyer said the court should have accepted the petition to free Allan earlier, as his health has deteriorated so badly that he can longer be considered as a "security threat" to Israel. Instead, the discussions at the court lingered for three days, "a delay that caused a possibly irreversible deterioration of the detainee's health condition."

Earlier on Wednesday, the State Attorney's Office ordered a medical examination of Allan and said he could be released immediately if a permanent brain damage will be diagnosed.

The hospital director said cerebral damage was observed, but it is yet to be determined whether the damage is reversible.

"During the day, his condition was further deteriorated and he was gradually losing coherent communication with his surroundings," the director said, adding that Allan was "confused."

Allan, a 31-year-old lawyer from the West Bank village of Einbous near Nablus, has been protesting his administrative detention which began in November 2014.

His hunger strike has triggered protest and tensions in the West Bank, with dozens of rallies of support throughout the Palestinian National Authority and Israel.

Violence has also soared, with a Palestinian being shot dead while attempting to stab an Israeli security officer in the fourth of such incidents over the past week.

Israel has initially said it will use on Allan a newly-passed law that allows force-feeding of hunger-striking prisoners, but that prospect did not materialize. Endit