JERUSALEM, May 3 (Xinhua) -- Various NGO's protest against treatment of Palestinian hunger-strikers in Israeli prisons, where they cannot receive legal counseling from lawyers unless they can stand up and ask for it, despite that some of the protesters have been hunger-striking for two months.

Several human rights groups, together with Adalah, the center for Arab minorities in Israel, protested on Thursday about the Israel Prison Service's (IPS) new policy, which they believe is meant to pressure the Palestinian inmates to quit their hunger strike.

"A prisoner who is interested in holding a meeting with an attorney needs to physically get up and tell the prison authorities he wants to attend the meeting," IPS spokeswoman Sivan Weitzman told Ha'aretz daily.

The IPS was responding to a letter sent by Adalah and other human rights groups, in which they threatened to appeal to Israel' s High Court unless the matter is not solved immediately.

The inmates are part of a group of 2,000 Palestinian hunger strikers, most of whom began the hunger protest earlier this month. They are protesting against Israel's administrative detention policy, solitary confinement and lessened jail privileges, like cellphones and television sets in the cells.