LONDON: President Mahmoud Abbas emphasized the Palestinian Authority’s efforts to support calls for the release of senior Fatah leader and Central Committee member Marwan Barghouti from an Israeli prison.

On Tuesday, Abbas received Fadwa Barghouti, his wife, at the presidential headquarters in Ramallah, affirming that his release has always been a top priority for both the presidency and the Fatah movement.

Abbas praised Barghouti, who has been in Israeli prisons since April 2002 after receiving five life sentences plus 40 years for his conviction of carrying out deadly attacks on Israelis during the peak of the Second Intifada of 2000.

Hamas proposed Barghouti’s name on the list of prisoners to be exchanged for Israeli captives, but Israel declined to release him in October. The 66-year-old national figure also served over four years in prison in 1978 for political activism. Analysts have long seen him as a potential presidential candidate if and when he is released from prison.

His family accused Israel Prison Service officers of having beaten him unconscious. In August, the Israeli far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir posted video footage showing him visiting Barghouti in prison and making threatening remarks to him.