GAZA CITY (Ma’an) – The mother of ex-prisoner Ayman Sharawna arrived Thursday morning in the Gaza Strip to meet her son, who was deported there in a deal to end a long hunger strike.

His mother first flew to Cairo and then to Gaza after Israeli authorities refused to grant her permission to travel there from the West Bank via Israel, sources in Gaza said.

Ayman Sharawna arrived in the Gaza Strip on Sunday after signing a deportation deal to end an 8-month long hunger strike in Israeli jail. He was then taken to a hospital where his condition was described as moderate.

Sharawna signed an agreement with Israeli authorities to be deported to Gaza for 10 years, bringing an end to a hunger strike he launched on July 1, according to the head of the Palestinian Prisoners Society.

The undersecretary of the PA Ministry of Detainee Affairs, Ziad Abu Ein, told Ma'an the agreement was signed without notifying the ministry. He said Israeli authorities were pressuring Samer Issawi, who has been on hunger strike for 228 days, to make a similar deal.