Leader of Palestinian hunger strike caught eating in his cell

Israel prison authorities on Monday released a video that reportedly shows the leader of a Palestinian hunger strike eating in his cell. Hundreds of Palestinian inmates in Israeli jails, led by Marwan Barghouti, have been refusing food since April 17. The prisoners are demanding better conditions in Israeli jails.

However, the video footage shows Barghouti secretly eat in his cell. Barghouti's wife and other Palestinian officials have dismissed the video as fake and an attempt to break the hunger strikers. Prison officials said the videos showed Barghouti eating cookies on April 27 and then a candy bar on Friday. He is being held in solitary confinement at the Kishon prison, The New York Times reported.

Though serving life sentences for five murders during the Second Intifada of the early 2000s, Barghouti, 57, is popular among Palestinians and is seen as a possible successor to the unpopular Palestinian Authority leader, Mahmoud Abbas. Some 850,000 Palestinians have been incarcerated since Israel’s occupation of their territories 50 years ago, Palestinian leaders say.