Israel’s genocidal war on Palestinians since last October has extended beyond the daily mass death, displacement, and starvation of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip. Behind the bars of Israeli prisons, Israel has been waging war against Palestinian prisoners, creating conditions that make the continuation of human life impossible. The effects of this brutal campaign have reverberated among prisoners’ families outside of jail, who are watching their loved ones being systematically starved, beaten, tortured, and degraded.
Shortly after October 7, Israel imposed a new set of rules in its cell blocks. In some detention centers like Ofer near Ramallah, the Israeli army was reportedly handed over control of the prison, while the Israel Prison Services guards were given a free hand in dealing with Palestinian inmates inside the jail sections. This shift was accompanied by a dramatic increase in the number of Palestinian detainees who were arrested after October 7, doubling the prisoner population as early on as mid-October. This included prisoners from Gaza, for whom the hardest part of the treatment was reserved.
In mid-May, CNN released an exposé based on the testimonies of Israeli whistleblowers about the horrific treatment of Palestinians from Gaza at the Israeli military base of Sde Teiman, now containing a detention center. The whistleblower testimonies detail a number of medieval practices to which Palestinian prisoners have been subjected, including being strapped down to beds while blindfolded and made to wear diapers, having unqualified medical trainees conduct procedures on them without anesthesia, having dogs set on them by prison guards, being regularly beaten or put into stress positions for offenses as minor as peeking beneath their blindfolds, having zip-tie wounds fester to the point of requiring amputation, and a host of other horrific measures.
On June 6, the New York Times published another story about Sde Teiman based on interviews with former detainees and Israeli military officers, doctors, and soldiers who worked at the prison, bringing new horrors to light about the treatment of Gazan prisoners. Detainee testimonies repeated many of these same accounts but also included additional disturbing accounts of sexual violence, including testimonies of rape and forcing detainees to sit on metal sticks that caused anal bleeding and “unbearable pain.”
Other depravities have been documented in several other prisons, often gloatingly by Israeli news channels who broadcast scenes of the abuse, including degrading treatment, in what can only be described as snuff films. Israeli prison doctors have assisted in the torture of Palestinian detainees, both before and after October 7. Alongside these acts of torture and humiliation, prison authorities have severely restricted prisoners’ food intake to the point of near-starvation, giving 20 prisoners enough food for two people.
The picture that emerges is one in which Israeli authorities are putting Palestinians in animal-like conditions calculated to torture, humiliate, and in many cases, to bring about their death. In March, the........