Jailed Palestinian leader sanctioned: Israeli radio

JERUSALEM - Agence France-Presse

Palestinian Fatah leader Marwan Barghuti is escorted by Israeli police into the Magistrate's Court for a hearing in Jerusalem on January 25, 2012. AFP Photo

Jailed Palestinian leader Marwan Barghuti has been punished by the Israeli prison authorities for writing a letter in which he urged an end to cooperation with Israel, public radio said yesterday.
 
Barghuti was put in solitary confinement and barred from the prison cafeteria, the radio added, without saying how long the sanctions would be in place.

"I call on the Palestinian Authority to end all forms of cooperation -- security and economic -- with the occupation," he wrote in a letter released on March 26.
 
A lifelong activist who supported the Oslo peace process in the 1990s, Barghuti is widely believed to have masterminded the second Palestinian intifada that erupted in 2000.

He was arrested in April 2002 and two years later was handed five life terms for his role in several deadly anti-Israeli attacks.
 
Barghuti has since said he never supported attacks on civilians inside Israel and in recent years has thrown his support behind peaceful resistance.

He was secretary general of the Fatah party led by Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.