Returning from detention, Gazans have testified to AFP that they were tortured by Israeli forces, accused by human rights organizations of flouting the rights of Palestinian prisoners.
Four Israeli organizations petitioned the Supreme Court in May against amendments that would make it easier to detain Gazans without trial after Hamas’s unprecedented attack on Israel on October 7 sparked the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.
After more than seven months in detention, the director of al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, Mohammed Abu Salmiya, was released on July 1 along with a dozen other prisoners. He said he had been subjected to “severe torture” and that many detainees had “died in the interrogation centers.”
On June 11, 50 other Gazans were released. An AFP correspondent was able to speak to some of them at the Kamal-Adwane hospital in Beit Lahia, in the northern Gaza Strip.
“I was beaten day and night. We were blindfolded, our hands and feet were chained, and they would release dogs on us,” said Mahmoud al-Zaanine, 37.
“I was tortured. I swear to God, they targeted my genitals four times,” the father explains, his eyes haggard.
Asked by AFP about these accusations, the Israeli army did not respond. On Thursday, a military spokesman referred to a statement published in May in which the army said it “totally rejects the allegations of systematic abuse”, including sexual abuse and electrocution, assuring that it respects Israeli and international law and “protects the rights” of detainees.
Investigations are opened when there are “suspicions of criminal misconduct,” the army also indicates.
According to her, the released detainees are under the control of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas “which can force them to provide false information.”
Contacted by AFP, the Israeli internal security agency Shin Beth did not comment.
On Wednesday, the UN denounced the “unacceptable” treatment of Palestinian prisoners and demanded an investigation.
“Where is Sinouar?”
“During the interrogation, they asked me where [le chef du Hamas pour Gaza] Yahya Sinouar, where were they [des membres] “Hamas, where the hostages were and why I participated in October 7,” said Mr. al-Zaanine, who responded that he did not take part in the Hamas attack.
This resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data.
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas in retaliation. Its offensive in Gaza, which Hamas has controlled since 2007, has killed more than 38,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to data from the Hamas government’s health ministry.
The army “offered money to reveal where Sinwar was hiding and where the tunnels were,” al-Zaanine said.
He said he was “banned from going to the toilet. We urinated on our clothes. We were denied medical care and there was barely anything to eat or drink.”
Othmane al-Kafarneh told AFP that his “hands had been injured by electric torture.”
He claims to have seen “more than 30 prisoners with amputated legs, some with both legs missing, and others with both eyes missing.”
In early April, the Israeli daily Haaretz published a letter addressed in particular to the Ministry of Defense, from a doctor working in the Sde Teiman detention center in southern Israel, which opened after October 7.
It states that prisoners “have had their legs amputated due to the compression of the handcuffs, that they defecate in diapers and are continually locked up, which violates medical ethics and the law.”
AFP journalists interviewed former detainees at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza, in May.
“My strength has diminished due to repeated blows to the head. Some young men have died due to excessive beatings and dog attacks,” said Moussa Youssef Mansour.
Three camps
The Israeli parliament amended the “illegal combatants” law in December, giving authorities the ability to hold prisoners for 45 days without administrative proceedings, up from 96 hours previously.
Similarly, they can be detained for 75 days without a court hearing — up from 14 days previously — with the possibility of extending that period to 180 days and restricting meetings with a lawyer.
“We know of three camps where people are apparently held blindfolded and handcuffed 24 hours a day, kneeling most of the time, put in partially open cages, beaten and starved,” Tal Steiner, director of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, one of the organizations that petitioned the Supreme Court, told AFP.
“We have taken legal action to request a significant change in the law so that these detainees have, firstly, access to the outside world, a fair trial, legal representation and, above all, an end to the abuse,” she said.
“Some detainees have not received a visit from a lawyer for more than eight months and are being tried via Zoom without being presented in court and without a lawyer,” she adds.
The army confirmed in May that 36 Palestinians had died in military detention centers since October 7, blaming the deaths on previous illnesses or injuries. Hamas claims the deaths were the result of torture and ill-treatment.
In May, at the first hearing before the Court, the Attorney General reported that there were “2,000 Gazan prisoners considered ‘unlawful combatants’ and held for more than 45 days.”
“Hundreds of detainees from Gaza are awaiting indictment. More than 1,500 detainees have been released to Gaza,” the magistrate said.