Mahmud Sarsak, a Palestinian soccer player who staged a hunger strike of nearly three months while in an Israeli jail, was freed on Tuesday and returned to the Gaza Strip.

"I cannot describe my joy," Sarsak told journalists in Beit Hanun. "But at the same time I cannot forget the cries of the prisoners who are still in Israeli prisons."

Sarsak, 25, was arrested in July 2009 while on his way from Gaza to sign on with a West Bank soccer club. He went on hunger strike to protest against his detention without charge under Israel's "unlawful combatants" law.

FIFA and rights group Amnesty International expressed concern over his ongoing detention.