Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike ends protest after sentencing

A Palestinian prisoner ended his hunger strike on Monday after an Israeli military court sentenced him to one year in prison, his wife said.

Khader Adnan, 40, has been in detention since last December.

The sentence, handed down by an Israeli military court on Monday, means he is expected to be released within two months, his wife and lawyer said.

Adnan began a hunger strike in early September against his detention and his health has been deteriorating.

"The judge's decision to sentence him for a year was based on my husband's bad health situation as a result of his hunger strike," said his wife, Randa.

The Israeli army confirmed the sentence on Monday. In a statement, it said the military court convicted Adnan of having been an active member of the banned Islamic Jihad organisation after he pleaded guilty in a plea bargain.

Adnan has staged protests during four previous stints in Israeli jails.

He spent 67 days on hunger strike in 2012 in protest against his imprisonment without charge or trial, a practice that Israel calls administrative detention. 

In 2015, he went without food for over 50 days after another arrest.

Adnan was not being held in administrative detention during his current prison stint, according to the Palestinian news agency Maan.

Last week, Adnan's wife decried the conditions of his detention, saying he had lost half his weight.

"His face was pale and his beard and hair were long. They didn't allow him to have a shower, change his clothes or trim his beard as a means of pressuring him to end his hunger strike," Randa told MEE.

Human rights groups have denounced Israel's use of administrative detention, saying it deprives Palestinians of due process.

"Israel jails many Palestinian detainees and prisoners inside Israel, violating international humanitarian law requiring that they not be transferred outside the occupied territory and restricting the ability of family members to visit them," Human Rights Watch said in a report earlier this year.