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The demonstrators oppose family visits to Palestinian prisoners for as long as Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, captured by militants from the Gaza Strip in a deadly cross-border raid, is denied visits by the International Red Cross.
Arab-Israeli rights group Adallah issued a statement calling the denial of family visits on Tuesday "populist and illegal," and accused the prison authorities of giving in to pressure from the demonstration's organisers.
But the prisons spokesman rejected the charge, saying that family visits would go ahead at other facilities such as Meggido in the north.
Shalit, who also has French nationality, was seized on June 25 2006 by three groups including the armed wing of the Islamist Hamas movement, which has ruled the Palestinian territory since ousting its Fatah rivals nearly a year later.
Conscript Shalit, 19 years old when he was captured, has become a cause celebre in Israel where his family has criticised the authorities for failing to secure his release.
Egypt has been trying, so far without success, to broker a prisoner swap deal that would see Shalit freed in exchange for hundreds of Palestinians.
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Arab-Israeli rights group Adallah issued a statement calling the denial of family visits on Tuesday "populist and illegal," and accused the prison authorities of giving in to pressure from the demonstration's organisers.
But the prisons spokesman rejected the charge, saying that family visits would go ahead at other facilities such as Meggido in the north.
Shalit, who also has French nationality, was seized on June 25 2006 by three groups including the armed wing of the Islamist Hamas movement, which has ruled the Palestinian territory since ousting its Fatah rivals nearly a year later.
Conscript Shalit, 19 years old when he was captured, has become a cause celebre in Israel where his family has criticised the authorities for failing to secure his release.
Egypt has been trying, so far without success, to broker a prisoner swap deal that would see Shalit freed in exchange for hundreds of Palestinians.
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