[JURIST] The Israel Supreme Court [official website] on Wednesday suspended the administrative detention of a Palestinian man who has been on a two-month hunger strike. The prisoner, Mohammad Allan, had been on a hunger strike since June 16 in order to protest his detention, which was set to last indefinitely. The court decided [Haaretz report] that he no longer posed a security threat due to his deteriorating health, as he had sustained brain damage from the fast. The release occurs a month after Israel passed a law [JURIST report] allowing the force-feeding of prisoners. The law first gained notoriety after Palestinian prisoners engaged in a hunger strike last year. Allan had been detained for his alleged allegiance with Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian armed group, and was allowed to be held for as long as was needed without charge under the law of administrative detention in Israel.

Relations between Israel and Palestine continue to be a significant international legal issue. In August Israel on sentenced [JURIST report] two alleged Jewish extremists to six months in prison without formal charges. In April, a UN independent board of inquiry announced that it uncovered evidence that at least 44 Palestinians were killed by “Israeli actions” [JURIST report] while sheltering at UN locations during last year’s Gaza war. In March the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs released [JURIST report] its 2014 Annual Humanitarian Overview, noting that Palestinian civilians continue to face daily threats to their physical safety and liberty, with 2014 holding the highest civilian death toll in the conflict since the annexation of the Palestinian territories in 1967. Also in March the UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights told the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) that human rights violations “fuel and shape the conflict” [JURIST report] in the occupied Palestinian territories.