CAIRO, Aug 23 (AFP) - The Arab League will hold an emergency meeting on Wednesday to discuss the issue of Palestinian and Arab prisoners held in Israeli jails, Palestinian delegate Mohammad Sobeih, told AFP Monday.
The meeting of permanent delegates, which will be chaired by the Moroccan representative, was called by the Palestinian Authority, Sobeih said.
The League will call on international bodies and human rights organisations to offer their support for what he called "prisoners of war, under the Geneva Convention".
Between 3,000 and 4,000 of the 7,500 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons are in the second week of a hunger strike to protest at the conditions in which they are being held.
Sobeih said two former prisoners will be among the Palestinian delegation at the meeting -- Mohammad Abu Jbara, who spent 25 years in jail, and Ziad Abu Ein.
"They will present first-hand accounts of the situation from their fellow inmates," Sobeih said. "The aim of the meeting is to throw light on the serious situation that these prisoners have to suffer and the racist treatment inflicted on them."