ISRAELI MPs gave preliminary approval on Monday to a law to allow the force-feeding of Palestinian prisoners who are on hunger strike.

However, the vote drew declarations of defiance from activists who said yesterday that it would not deter the inmates.

Some 120 Palestinians held by Israel began refusing food on April 24 in protest at their detention without trial. 

Since then the number has risen to nearly 300 and Israel’s Prisons Service admits that 70 have been hospitalised.

Palestinians suspected of security offences are often jailed without trial and Israel avoids court proceedings on the excuse that they could expose sensitive intelligence information — a practice that has drawn harsh international criticism.

The new legislation would permit Israeli authorities to seek court orders to force medical treatment on prisoners on health grounds. 

Monday’s vote was the first of four needed for the Bill to become law.

The measure is opposed by the Israeli Medical Association (IMA), which represents most Israeli doctors, but is backed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.

The IMA says “forced medical treatment, including force feeding is forbidden” and that implementing such a measure would violate internationally accepted medical ethics.

Palestinian Prisoners Club chairman Qadoura Fares, whose organisation fights for the rights of Palestinians in custody, said the strike would continue and that the proposed law could not “break the will of the prisoners.”

He warned that “forced feeding could kill prisoners,” citing the 1980 deaths of two Palestinian prisoners who died during attempts to force-feed them.