Image Credit... The New York Times

But social media have spread the siren this time, first on Khader Adnan, a member of Islamic Jihad who was released last month from administrative detention after a 66-day fast that left him in grave condition. Attention then shifted to Hana Shalabi, a female prisoner deported to Gaza after a 43-day strike, and is now focused on Mr. Halahleh and Mr. Diab, who also are members of Islamic Jihad, a radical and militant Palestinian faction.

In court on Thursday, after Mr. Diab fainted and Mr. Halahleh testified, the judges took a break to review their secret files, then returned without issuing a ruling, promising one soon, according to people who were in the courtroom.

Mr. Fares of the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club said the goals of the current strike were to remove some of the restrictions that were imposed on prisoners before the release of a captive Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, including isolation, limits on family visits and denial of access to university classes. Sivan Weizman, a spokeswoman for the Israeli Prison Service, said that a team was working to address the requests and would meet again with the prisoners’ leaders within a few days.

For most of the days since Mr. Halahleh stopped eating, his relatives, neighbors and friends have kept vigil at his home here in a remote part of the Hebron hills from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m., many of them also going without food in sympathy.

The men sit on white plastic chairs outside, spilling from a makeshift structure of black burlap and green two-by-fours, topped with Islamic Jihad flags and a banner with Mr. Halahleh’s portrait and a picture of a shackled wrist. Inside the white stone house — where family members say the son was arrested at 1:30 a.m. on June 27, 2010, by soldiers who came with dogs — women crowd on cushions on the floor, their heads covered by hijabs and their bare feet by blankets, praying and talking and pleading with the television in the corner for any speck of news.