The imprisonment of Palestinian health workers without charge and new death penalty laws targeting Palestinians expose a detention system that disregards humanitarian law, due process and equality before the law.

There has rightly been a major outcry about the abusive treatment of people on the Global Samud Flotilla, whose “crime” was taking aid to Gaza. But it is important to also protest and advocate for the humane treatment of over 3,000 Gazans in the euphemistically titled “administrative detention” and 9,000 political prisoners in Israel.

During the years after the appalling attacks of October 2022, much prominence was given to the treatment and return of Israeli hostages, yet the imprisoned Gazan “administrative detainees” get less and less media attention. I am going to focus on two aspects that highlight the Israeli government’s complete failure to consider international humanitarian law – the imprisonment of health workers without charge and the recent legislation making execution the default sentence for Palestinians involved in deadly attacks.

Imprisoning health care workers

Since the start of the genocide in Gaza, Israel has arrested hundreds of essential medical workers, massively further damaging an already challenged healthcare system now under repeated attack and desperately short of even basic medical supplies.

According to the Physicians for Human Rights in Israel (PHRI), dozens of medical workers remain........

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