Israel extends remand of Palestinian parliament speaker

RAMALLAH: An Israeli military court remanded Palestinian parliament speaker Aziz Dweik in custody for a further five days on Thursday following his arrest in the occupied West Bank earlier this month.   

Wearing a tracksuit and his feet in shackles, Dweik appeared before the military court in Ofer, near the West Bank political capital of Ramallah.   

Addressing himself to journalists, Dweik said Israel had no right to put him on trial and slammed the Jewish state's arrest of dozens of elected Palestinian officials.   

Dweik, a member of the ruling Hamas party, was arrested at his Ramallah home on August 5. Two days later, he was admitted to a Jerusalem hospital after complaining of dizziness and chest pains.   

"My health is bad," the 58-year-old speaker told reporters at Thursday's court appearance.   

Dweik - regarded as a terrorist by Israel - was elected speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council in February after Hamas thrashed Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's moderate Fatah party in parliamentary polls.   

Israel detained 64 elected officials of Hamas, including a third of the cabinet and 26 MPs, after the group's military wing claimed responsibility with two other groups for the capture of an Israeli soldier in a deadly cross-border raid from Gaza on June 25.