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Palestinian detainee reveals that Israeli occupation forces used him as a human shield for 40 days

Palestinian Information Center – August 15, 2024

RAMALLAH – The testimony of a Palestinian detainee revealed that Israeli occupation forces (IOF) used him and another prisoner as human shields for 40 days in Gaza.

The Palestinian Prisoner Affairs Authority and the Palestinian Prisoner Society said in a joint statement on Thursday that the IOF forced the Palestinian detainee to wear a military uniform, placed a camera on him, and accompanied him with a drone.

The Authority and the Society confirmed that if the prisoner refused to be used as a human shield, he would be subjected to brutal beatings, deprived of food and basic needs, in addition to being shot and prevented from receiving medical treatment.

The joint statement presented the testimony of the 21-year-old Gaza youth “M.D.,” who was used by the IOF as a human shield for more than 40 days, along with another detainee who was with him.

The same source said that the Palestinian young man, who was working at the Kerm Abu Salem crossing, was subjected to acts of torture, deliberate humiliation and assault, starvation, terrorism and threats, after he and a group of citizens were arrested by the IOF soldiers last June and detained between the Palestinian-Egyptian borders and Rafah.

According to the testimony of the Gaza youth, the IOF used him as a human shield on a daily basis, through several methods, such as placing him at the front of IOF military vehicles, with his hands and feet tied, and forcing him to wear the Israeli military uniform and attaching a camera to his body.

According to the horrifying testimony of the young man, if he refused to go along with the IOF orders, he was subjected to beatings, and added that a drone was used to guide him during his movements. During his detention, the young man confirmed that the IOF soldiers did not provide him with enough food, deprived him of using the bathroom or taking a shower, and this continued throughout his detention period, until he was shot in the chest on the 6th of August, and he remained without treatment for about half an hour.

The Palestinian young man found himself the next day in the Israeli Soroka hospital, where he stayed for 3 days, until he was released on the 9th of August through the Kerm Abu Salem crossing, and he was then transported by ambulance to the Nasser Medical Hospital. The tests showed that the injury caused him a fracture in his chest and another injury in his lung, and he still needs urgent treatment.

For their part, the two bodies concerned with the affairs of Palestinian prisoners considered that the young man from Gaza was exposed to a complex and horrific war crime, starting from his arrest and using him as a human shield throughout this period, and torturing and humiliating him, and then injuring him, and releasing him from the hospital without completing his treatment.

The two bodies once again called on the international human rights institutions to regain their necessary and required role in the face of the ongoing genocide war and the systematic crimes committed by Israel against prisoners and detainees, and to assume their necessary responsibilities, and stressed the need to overcome the horrific state of impotence that surrounds their role, and to go beyond this role that is limited only to monitoring crimes and violations and issuing positions and statements, to a level that leads to holding Israel and its supporters accountable.

International humanitarian law and the 1949 Geneva Convention prohibit armies from using civilians as human shields, and the International Criminal Court considers this a war crime.

Israel has been continuously waging its devastating war on the Gaza Strip for more than 10 months, which has so far resulted in more than 40,000 martyrs and more than 92,000 injuries, mostly women and children, in addition to massive destruction of vital facilities, residential buildings, and an exacerbating famine in the besieged Strip.

Israel continues its war despite two resolutions from the UN Security Council to stop it immediately, and orders from the International Court of Justice to end the invasion of Rafah and take measures to prevent genocide and improve the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza.

August 15, 2024 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , | 1 Comment

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the Problem of Torture

By Andrew P. Napolitano | Ron Paul Institute | August 8, 2024

In the months following the attacks of 9/11, the government laid the blame for orchestrating them on Osama bin Ladin. Then, after it murdered bin Ladin, the government decided that the true mastermind was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

By the time of bin Ladin’s death, Mohammed had already been tortured by CIA agents for three years at various black sites and charged with conspiracy to commit mass murder, to be tried before an American military tribunal at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Mohammed and four other alleged conspirators have been awaiting trial since their arrivals at Gitmo in 2006. Since then, numerous government military and civilian prosecutors, as well as numerous military judges, have rotated into and out of the case. Two weeks ago, the government and the defendants agreed to a guilty plea in return for life in prison at Gitmo. Then, last week, the Department of Defense abruptly changed its mind and rescinded its approval of the guilty pleas.

Here is the backstory.

The concept of military tribunals for the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks was born in the administration of President George W. Bush, who argued that the attacks, though conducted by civilians on civilians, were of military magnitude and thus warranted a military response. Throughout the entire 22-year existence of the U.S. military prison at Gitmo, no one has been tried for causing or carrying out the crimes of 9/11. The government tried only one person for crimes related to 9/11. That was Zacarias Moussaoui, who pleaded guilty in federal court in Virginia to conspiracy for being the 20th hijacker and then was tried in a penalty phase trial where the jury chose life in prison.

Bush’s rationale not only brought us the fruitless and destructive wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; it also brought a host of legal problems unforeseen by Bush and his revenge-over-justice colleagues. The first legal issue was conspiracy. Since Mohammed did not carry out the attacks, he could only be charged with planning them. But conspiracy is not a war crime, and thus no military tribunal could hear the case. So Congress came up with a historic first — a military tribunal that would try civilian crimes.

The next issue was where to try Mohammed and his colleagues. President Barack Obama wanted to close Gitmo, which costs $540 million annually, and try Mohammed and the others in federal courts. This would have been consistent with federal law and the U.S. Constitution. But Republicans in Congress viewed Mohammed as too dangerous to bring onto U.S. soil, and so Congress enacted legislation that prohibits the removal of Mohammed and the others to the U.S. for any purpose.

The prohibition on removal means that any life terms would need to be spent at Gitmo. It also means that there would be a legal obstacle to the execution of a death sentence, as Gitmo is not equipped to execute anyone.

Most troubling, however, is the government’s problem of how to address the issue of torture. Bush believed that military men on military juries would neither cringe at torture nor hesitate to impose a death sentence. Yet, when defendants at Gitmo, in non-9/11-related cases, described the torture that CIA agents and military officials had inflicted upon them, military jurors were repulsed at what they heard and recommended clemency even for those who caused deaths.

These events — filing legally baseless charges, prohibiting the removal of civilian defendants to civilian courts, and fear of the likely reaction of military jurors to testimony about torture — caused the prosecution team to rethink the entire idea of putting Mohammed on trial, and thus in March 2022, the government initiated secret plea-bargaining negotiations with defense counsel.

In large measure, government prosecutors — now the fourth team since 2006 — recognized that Bush’s torturers had so brutalized the defendants that their so-called voluntary confessions would likely be tossed by the trial judge or rejected by a jury. Moreover, there are serious ethical issues when lawyers defend torture — so serious that it could jeopardize their careers.

Why would the government agree to such a plea bargain for the persons it claims are the monsters who murdered 3,000 Americans on 9/11 and triggered all the horrors that followed those murders? What does the government fear?

What does it always fear? THE TRUTH.

Since the trial judge — the fourth judge on the case — had already accepted the guilty pleas before the DoD changed its mind, it is unclear if he will enforce them.

If he does not, one day there will be a trial. At trial, the defendants will be permitted to bring the government’s imperialistic wars, its tortures and its foreknowledge of 9/11 into the courtroom. The government knows that much of its behavior — from the CIA-orchestrated overthrow of a popularly elected prime minister of Iran in the early 1950s to the untruthful excuses for toppling Saddam Hussein — will show American foreign policy at its imperialistic and violent worst.

And the hours and weeks and months and years of repeated torture — all of it criminal — will undermine the case against Mohammed and the others.

This is what happens when the fabric of our legal system is interfered with for authoritarian reasons. The tragedy of 9/11 happened on Bush’s watch. What did the CIA know before 9/11? Bush compounded his ignorance and failures with boasts of bravado and torture — all of which have come back to haunt his current successor in the White House.

Defense and Justice Department lawyers have recognized that they cannot try this case without material damage to the scheme of American empire, built on death, lies and torture, without revealing the names and methods of the folks who did these horrible deeds and the lies of the presidents who authorized them — and without the truth coming out at last.

What good has come from Bush’s torturers? None.

To learn more about Judge Andrew Napolitano, visit https://JudgeNap.com.

COPYRIGHT 2024 ANDREW P. NAPOLITANO

DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM

August 8, 2024 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Palestinian activist succumbs to injuries after release from Israeli detention

This file photo shows female Palestinian activist Wafa Jarrar
Press TV – August 5, 2024

A female Palestinian activist has succumbed to injuries she sustained during an Israeli raid on her home back in May.

Wafa Jarrar died on Monday from injuries she had sustained when Israeli forces detained her on May 21.

Jarrar suffered severe injuries, and as a result underwent above-knee amputations.

The Israeli authorities reportedly released her shortly after her legs were amputated to avoid responsibility for her treatment.

The Israeli army claimed that Jarrar was injured in a blast while inside the military vehicle, where she was kept detained for four hours.

Despite its claim, the regime issued an administrative detention order against Jarrar before releasing and handing her over to the Palestinian Liaison Office, while she was in a critical condition.

Last month, the Euro-med human rights monitor said the Israeli army bears full responsibility for the life and safety of Wafa Jarrar.

“This is a clear effort by Israel’s army to avoid taking responsibility for the serious injuries Jarrar sustained during her detention, which resulted in the amputation of her legs above the knees as well as damage to her spine and lungs, and to avoid its legal obligation to provide the necessary medical treatment,” the Euro-med human rights monitor said on July 1.

“What Jarrar, age 49, was subjected to from the first moment of her arrest until her release reflects the repeated and systematic violations faced by Palestinians during their detention by Israeli forces, including arbitrary arrests, abuse, use as human shields, torture, and denial of medical care,” it added.

Wafa is the wife of Hamas leader Abdul Jabbar Jarrar who has been held in Israeli jails since February 2022 under administrative detention.

There are reportedly more than 8,000 Palestinians held in Israeli jails, with hundreds of the inmates incarcerated under the so-called practice of administrative detention.

Human rights organizations say Israel violates all the rights and freedoms granted to prisoners by the Fourth Geneva Convention, noting administrative detention violates their right to due process since the evidence is withheld from prisoners while they are held for lengthy periods without being charged, tried, or convicted.

Palestinian detainees have continuously resorted to open-ended hunger strikes in an attempt to express outrage at their detention. Israeli jail authorities keep Palestinian prisoners under deplorable conditions without proper hygienic standards. Palestinian inmates have also been subject to systematic torture, harassment, and repression.

Since the outbreak of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza last October, the regime has also intensified arrest campaigns in the West Bank and al-Quds.

In a report issued over the weekend, the Commission of Detainees’ and Ex-detainees’ Affairs, the Palestinian Prisoners Society, the Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association said Israeli forces had arrested about 9,920 people, including 345 women, 690 children and 93 journalists, since October 7.

More than 7,500 administrative detention orders have been issued since October 7, including new orders and renewals, according to the report.

The Israeli arrest campaigns, the groups said, were also accompanied by physical assaults, threats against detainees and their families, destruction of the detainees’ houses, and seizure of their properties.

The Israeli forces also carried out field executions against detainees and their family members, the report added.

“Since October 7, at least 20 detainees were martyred in Israeli prisons and their identities have been revealed,” the report said, adding that dozens of detainees from Gaza also lost their lives in Israeli prisons and detention centers, but the Israeli authorities refrained from declaring their names or the causes of the their death.

“The bodies of 18 detainees who were martyred after October 7 are still withheld” by the Israeli regime, the report said.

August 5, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel’s Rule of Law

It exists only for Jews

By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • August 1, 2024

Does anyone in Israel in a position of power truly understand what the expressions “human rights” and “rule of law” really mean? Developments over the past ten months in Gaza would suggest “No,” that Israel’s government, its legal system, and its constitution exist solely to empower the state to do whatever it wishes, which in the current version includes the genocidal elimination of the Palestinian people and the theft of their land and property to be incorporated into a Greater Israel that plausibly will include the already annexed Syrian Golan Heights as well as all of historic Palestine running from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.

But even given the fundamental dishonesty over the Jewish state and what it represents, there is something truly frightening about some recent developments which suggest that the long running United States government pander to Israel and its presumed interests have poisoned the chalice, making Americans absolutely complicit in the Israeli war crimes and other assorted crimes against humanity. And the level of control over Washington by Israel virtually guarantees that it will only get worse.

I am, of course, referring to the recent state visit of the world’s leading war criminal Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Washington, where he was worshipped by both Congress and the White House alike together with considerable fawning from the heavily Jewish-influenced media. Netanyahu, to put it succinctly, spoke for an hour in his address to the US Congress, emitting lie after lie. And the Congress critters responded with an outburst of love combined with total subservience, delivering 53 standing ovations, close to one per minute. The most exuberant ovation occurred when Netanyahu denounced the 50,000 or so demonstrators who surrounded the Capitol building to express their disgust at the Jewish mass murderer’s presence. Bibi called the protesters, some of whom were pepper-sprayed and arrested by a heavy police presence including 360 imported New York City Policemen fresh from their beatings of protesters at Columbia University, “useful idiots paid for by Iran.” That particular lie produced paroxysms of celebration among the leaping and waving Congressmen. Given that performance, does anyone need any confirmation that free speech seems to be off the agenda when it comes to Israel and the clowns who nominally represent the American people in Washington, who once upon time swore an oath to support the Constitution, but now consider speaking ill of the Jewish state to be a “hate crime.” Indeed, bills have been introduced in Congress to that effect.

It is interesting to go through his speech to determine what Netanyahu was trying to accomplish and what lies he thought he could get away with. Actually, he did nothing but lie while blaming most of his neighbors, particularly Iran, for the turmoil that Israel has caused in the Middle East for the past 75 years. And predictably, much of the coverage of the Netanyahu appearance in the mainstream media on the following day was toothless and even laudatory. It generally reflected what was hailed as Bibi’s “fiery speech” that “did not give an inch” which vowed to continue fighting until “total victory” is achieved. “It’s a clash between barbarism and civilization. It’s a clash between those who glorify death and those who sanctify life.” Ironically, Netanyahu was right about the clash of civilization though he was wrong about who represented which side: Israel backed completely by the US is pure evil. And the Netanyahu visit should be seen as a call to arms. The Jewish state is struggling economically and militarily in its war of extermination in Gaza and it knows it is not in any shape to take on Hezbollah and Iran, so it has decided to let the United States do the heavy lifting. Reading between the lines on what occurred in meetings with the two presidential aspirants as well as with a non-compos-mentis Joe Biden, it is clear that Netanyahu expects American boys and girls to do his fighting for him as well as covering the costs.

American complicity in the genocide in Gaza as well as in two possible wars in Lebanon and Iran due to the Israeli embrace is a tragedy for all parties involved, but the damage being done to future generations of American citizens cannot be remedied. Our country has done many bad things, but this whole hearted alliance with unmitigated evil is a betrayal of the birthright of every American.

So how low can you go, but the tale of Netanyahu visits Congress was soon joined by another truly awful story that demonstrates that there is no bottom to the evil in the minds and hearts of Israel’s leaders as well as among a large majority of the Israeli people, which Mondoweiss calls a “genocide from above and below.” Few Americans are aware of the atrocities that occur by virtue of what the Israelis choose to call their legal system. There is a body of law that is applicable to protect Jews and their interests, but where those interests collide with those of the native Palestinians, be they Christian or Muslim, only one outcome is acceptable even when something comparable to a legal procedure takes place. This has enabled the horrible settlement movement with something like 800,000 Jewish settlers having stolen Palestinian land and other property and has meant that Palestinians who were driven from their homes by force when Israel was founded have no ability to return to their own homes. At its most extreme, severely injuring or even killing a Palestinian, which occurs regularly, often at the hands of the heavily armed settlers, is a crime that is almost never prosecuted. To cite only one recent example, Palestinian-America journalist Shireen Abu Akleh who was wearing a clearly visible journalist vest was shot and killed by an Israeli army sniper in May 2022. In spite of repeated demands that her murder be fully investigated, no one was ever identified or punished for the killing. Israel has also killed 20 other journalists in the past several years with no one being punished. Often Israeli soldiers stand by and watch crimes involving Jewish perpetrators, never interceding to help the Arab victim. If the Palestinians resist they are immediately labeled as “terrorists” and have no rights of self-defense against the occupiers, be they army or nominally civilians.

A story that appeared a week after the Netanyahu visit illustrates perfectly the two-tiered justice in Israel and the occupied territories. There are currently nearly 10,000 Palestinians in Israeli prisons, the number having increased sharply since the war against Gaza began. Many are Gazans, but an increasing number are from the West Bank, which is also being targeted for “settlement” and eventual annexation. Many are held under what is referred to as “preventive detention,” in which they are not charged with a crime, do not appear in any court, and are held at the will of the Israeli army or police. In jail, they are frequently tortured and starved. If they are ever released, they show the signs of the torture and Israeli human rights groups, among other witnesses, have provided substantial evidence of what is taking place behind closed doors. Israel soldiers are, for their part, not shy about what they do to Palestinians, posting photos and videos online of dead Palestinians, torture in detention areas, and the gleeful destruction of Gazan homes and property.

The story is as follows: There are a number of detention centers run by the Israeli Army that are generally used to torture Palestinians prisoners, not in the old fashioned “intelligence” role to obtain “information,” but just for the entertainment of the soldiers who are the jailers. Sde Teiman, one such center in the southern Negev desert region, recently made the news due to a particularly outrageous bit of torture engaged in by ten of the soldiers in charge of the prisoners. Conditions in Sde Taiman reportedly included “Electric shocks, amputations due to bad conditions, severe beatings, surgery without anesthesia, playing loud music until inmates’ ears bleed, deaths due to bad sanitary conditions, systematic torture and sexual abuse.”

A Palestinian from Gaza was reported serially sodomized and otherwise raped at the detention site using various implements even including a cell phone which was inserted in the man’s rectum and turned on for the amusement of the Israeli soldiers. The victim also had a wooden stick inserted in similar fashion and it was believed that he was only one of a number of other prisoners who were treated in that same way, which appears to be systemic throughout the detention facilities run by the army. The activity was only exposed when the victim began bleeding heavily both internally and externally and was unable to walk with a “serious wound in his rectum area”, which may have occurred if or when the phone was removed from inside of him and he was taken to a hospital where what had taken place was revealed. The army, somewhat uncharacteristically, sent some military policemen to the center to detain the soldiers for questioning but the suspects fought back using pepper spray and building barriers. When nine of the men (one went AWOL) were eventually taken to a nearby military base at Beit Lid, the MPs were confronted almost immediately by an angry crowd of civilians, consisting largely of settlers and ultra-nationalists, led by several Likud party parliamentarians who demanded that the soldiers be set free. Something like a melee ensued. The unruly crowd chanted its support for torture and even called for the summary execution of the Palestinian prisoners, which has been an “option” supported by some in the Netanyahu government.

The rioters were so aggressive that they actually broke into the Israeli military base and there was considerable support for their actions even coming from Justice Minister Yariv Levin, who said he was “shocked” to see IDF troops being detained for questioning “in a way that is suitable for arresting dangerous criminals.” He added that the soldiers were doing a “holy job” at the base. Far-right Knesset member Simcha Rotman called the troops “heroes,” instead attacking Israel’s “justice and enforcement systems” for detaining them.

Typically, later in the day, when asked by the press about the rape accusations, US State Department Deputy Spokesman Vedant Patel refused to say whether gang raping and torturing Palestinian prisoners would be considered a war crime, even if conclusively demonstrated by witnesses and other evidence. Patel explained “So the reports of abuse are deeply concerning, and we have been clear and consistent with Israel and the IDF that they need to treat all detainees humanely and with dignity in accordance with humanitarian law.” He said that the US was going to let “due process” play out in this case. The western media that is bothering to cover the story are refusing to even use the word “rape” or “sodomy” in reference to the allegations, with the BBC describing how the soldiers are accused of “severely mistreating a Palestinian prisoner” while the New York Times prefers to call it “suspected abuse”.

At the heart of the discussion is the fact that Israel’s Knesset uniquely has a proposed law that was first formulated in 2022 by current National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir which would give automatic immunity to any soldier or policeman who kills or seriously injures any Palestinian. The immunity does not apply if the victim is a Jew. The law still has not passed through parliament, but many conservatives in Israel believe it is the guideline used by the military and judiciary de facto. Ben-Gvir has, in fact, denounced the questioning of the nine men as “shameful,” adding that the Israeli security establishment should support the soldiers and “learn from the prison service: light treatment of terrorists is over. Soldiers need to have our full support.” Ben-Gvir is also supporting a separate bill that would authorize the systematic execution of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. It also does not apply to Jews. In a video statement, Ben-Gvir said that Israel should be able to kill Palestinian prisoners with a “shot to the head.” He also recommended that Palestinian prisoners be given just enough food to keep them alive until the execution law comes into effect.

So, when it comes to human rights Israel lives in another parallel universe where there is one set of rules for Jews and other for gentiles. Perhaps the easily visible brutality evident in the recent Netanyahu speech to Congress coupled with stories like that out of Sde Teiman and the daily horror inflicted on the Gazans will bring about some kind of wake-up for the American public, which has been heavily propagandized and continues to believe in the myth of the perpetual victimhood of the Jewish people. The real victims of the “miracle of Israel” are those in western countries that the Jewish diaspora continues to buy and manipulate as well as the poor Palestinians who are forced to live under a form of daily repression and humiliation that is almost unimaginable.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

August 1, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | , , , , | 4 Comments

Israel Used Dogs, Waterboarding to Torture Palestinian Prisoners – UN

Sputnik – 31.07.2024

Palestinians in Israeli captivity have been subjected to torture, including electrocution, waterboarding and being attacked by dogs, with at least 53 detainees dying in custody since October 7, the UN human rights watchdog said in a report out Wednesday.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)’s report on the “Detention in the context of the escalation of hostilities in Gaza” looked into testimonies of torture and other ill-treatment committed by Israelis and Palestinian armed groups from October 2023 to June 2024.

“Many of those detained and subsequently released have reported being subject to forms of torture or other ill-treatment, including severe beatings, electrocution, being forced to remain in stress positions for prolonged periods, or waterboarding,” the report read.

Palestinians who spoke with the OHCHR said they had been subjected to violence and humiliation in a systematic manner, “including through repeated serious physical assaults, setting dogs on the detainees, in some cases resulting in attacks and bites, and widespread threats and insults.”

Israel detained large numbers of Palestinians – men, women, children, doctors, journalists, human rights defenders, and patients – in the days after Hamas’ October 7 attack. Of more than 10,000 workers and patients from Gaza who were taken into custody in October, around 1,000 remain unaccounted for. Dozens others have died.

“At least 53 detainees from Gaza and the West Bank have died in Israeli detention since 7 October,” the report said.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said the testimonies gathered by his office and other entities indicated “a range of appalling acts, such as waterboarding and the release of dogs on detainees,” which he described as a “flagrant violation” of international humanitarian law.

July 31, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Palestinian prisoner raped by Israeli guards at notorious facility

Press TV – July 30 2024

A Palestinian prisoner has reportedly been subjected to rape by Israeli guards at a notorious facility set up to hold Palestinians after the launch of the regime’s ongoing genocidal war against the Gaza Strip.

The Palestinian Prisoners Club (PPC), a watchdog, and several Israeli media outlets reported the development on Monday.

“This is a new rape crime committed against a detainee at the Sde Teiman camp (in the Negev Desert) by a group of prison guards,” Abdullah Al-Zaghari, head of the PPC, told AFP.

The victim has suffered serious injury as a result of the abuse and is unable to walk, Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz and public broadcaster KAN reported.

Israeli facilities hold an estimated 9,700 Palestinian prisoners.

Inmates have consistently reported being subjected to torture and sexual abuse.

The regime, however, has significantly ramped up its detention spree in Gaza and the occupied West Bank since October 7, when it brought the coastal sliver under the war.

Ever since, human rights statements and prisoner accounts have been rife with reports of intensified acts of torture by the regime’s forces, including food and water deprivation, intimidation, electrical shocks, mock executions, and violent sexual abuse.

Subsequent to the Monday reports, the Israeli military police allegedly raided the Sde Teiman center as part of an investigation into the case, rounding up 10 troops stationed at the facility.

The police forces were met with resistance on the part of the troops, who barricaded themselves in and used pepper spray to avoid arrest.

The regime’s extremist finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, however, described the suspects as “heroic warriors.”

Itamar Ben-Gvir, a similarly hard-right official, who oversees the prisons where Palestinians are detained, also called the Israeli troops the “best heroes” and described the arrests as “shameful.”

July 30, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , | Leave a comment

‘Netanyahu prevents 150 sick Gaza children from seeking treatment abroad’

Press TV – July 29, 2024

A new report released by Israeli media says the regime’s prime minister has prevented more than 100 sick Gazan children from seeking medical treatment abroad.

The Sunday report by Israel’s Kan public broadcaster said Benjamin Netanyahu has decided to prevent about 150 sick and wounded Palestinian children from leaving Gaza for the United Arab Emirates to receive treatment.

The Kan report said the Palestinian kids were ready to be flown out to the United Arab Emirates on Monday afternoon.

The new development came after the Israeli premier had earlier opposed the establishment of a field hospital in the southern part of the occupied territories for the treatment of Gazan children whose health condition was deteriorating amid the regime’s genocidal war on the besieged territory.

Physicians for Human Rights, which is a US-based non-profit human rights nongovernmental organization, says Israel has consistently failed to fulfill its obligations in this regard in in previous experiences.

While plans had been made for 250 sick and wounded Palestinians to depart Gaza for the UAE during the current week, Palestinian sources in Gaza said those in need of treatment are at least 100 times this number, noting that there are at least 25,000 patients who need to travel abroad.

They added that the number of sick and wounded people who have left the blockaded Palestinian territory since the beginning of the Israeli aggression does not exceed 5,000.

Physicians for Human Rights and a number of other human rights organizations have filed a petition, demanding that patients and wounded people facing life-threatening conditions be allowed to leave Gaza to receive the necessary treatment.

July 29, 2024 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

UNRWA: UNRWA staff tortured in Israeli jails

Palestinian Information Center – July 12, 2024

GAZA – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) said on Friday that its staff who were detained by Israeli forces were subjected to “ill-treatment and torture.”

This came in a press conference held by the Agency’s Commissioner-General, Philippe Lazzarini, during a pledging conference at the United Nations headquarters in New York.

Today, UNRWA is staggering under the weight of relentless attack, Lazzarini said.

“In Gaza, it has paid a terrible price, 195 of our colleagues were killed and nearly 190 installations were damaged or destroyed, killing over 500 people seeking United Nations protection.”

It comes at a critical time as UNRWA undergoes unprecedented attacks and systematic attempts to dismantle it, he added.

“It is a tribute to our staff working across the region, including on the humanitarian front lines in Gaza.”

“We are committed to continuing to deliver assistance and basic services, including education to Palestinian boys and girls.”

Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, also spoke at the UNWRA pledging conference at the UN headquarters in New York.

Guterres appealed to everyone to protect UNRWA and its employees, saying that “there is no alternative to it.”

July 13, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Christians in occupied Jerusalem see marked surge in Israeli settler attacks

The Cradle | July 12, 2024

Settler attacks on the Christian community in occupied Jerusalem have surged since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza, according to Hebrew reports.

Hebrew news outlet Channel 13 reported on 12 July that over the past three months, there have been at least 36 recorded incidents of violence or abuse against Christians.

This includes 17 incidents of Israeli settlers spitting on Christian worshippers, nine acts of vandalism, five assaults, and five cases of verbal abuse – all under police protection.

The government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also been imposing taxes on Churches and Church property. The Israeli government claims the taxes are routine financial matters, yet the Christian community has accused Tel Aviv of a “coordinated attack on the Christian presence in the Holy Land” and a violation of a centuries-old status quo.

“In this time, when the whole world, and the Christian world in particular, are constantly following the events in Israel, we find ourselves, once again, dealing with an attempt by authorities to drive the Christian presence out of the Holy Land,” wrote the heads of the major Christian denominations in a joint letter to Netanyahu late last month.

Earlier in June, a report released by Israeli NGO Rossing Center for Education and Dialogue reported a significant increase in Israelis attacking Christians throughout 2023.

“The ongoing shift towards the far-right, a growing sense of nationalism, and the emphasis on Israel primarily as a state for the Jewish population have collectively undermined both the legal and perceived sense of equality for any minority within the country,” the report read.

Attacks and restrictions against Christian worshippers by Israeli police are also common in the holy city.

While Christians face an uptick in abuse and oppression under Netanyahu’s far-right government, they have always suffered under occupation in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

In 2019, the head of the Sebastia Diocese of the Greek Orthodox Church in Jerusalem, Archbishop Atallah Hanna, accused Israeli forces of trying to kill him after he was hospitalized with poisoning following an Israeli tear gas attack on his church.

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , | Leave a comment

How Ukraine Tortured and Slaughtered Donbass

By Kit Klarenberg | Al Mayadeen | July 11, 2024

Almost immediately after the proxy war erupted, ISIS-tier footage of the torture and murder of Russians in Ukrainian custody emerged.

On July 6th, the New York Times published an astonishing investigation: In Ukraine, Killings of Surrendering Russians Divide an American-Led Unit. The article documents in grim detail how Chosen Company, an international volunteer battalion for Kiev, routinely executes Russian prisoners of war. It is the very first mainstream admission that this practice – a brazen breach of the Geneva Conventions, and a grave war crime – is widespread among Ukraine’s fighters, both foreign and homegrown.

Almost immediately after the proxy war erupted, ISIS-tier footage of the torture and murder of Russians in Ukrainian custody – unarmed, injured, surrendering and/or bound – began circulating on social networks and Telegram channels. However, save for a single incident in April 2022, when Georgian Legion fighters gleefully filmed themselves surveying a scene near Bucha, where they ambushed and killed multiple fleeing VDV soldiers, Western journalists have either ignored these abuses, or outright denied Kiev endorses or engages in such activity.

Georgian Legion chief Mamuka Mamulashvili has nonetheless justified this conduct, openly boasting that his soldiers “tie [POWs’] hands and feet sometimes” before killing them, and “not a single [Russian] will be taken prisoner.” The New York Times probe strongly suggests this strategy is not confined to the Legion. Multiple Chosen Company fighters testified to witnessing sadistic executions of POWs, and their fellow soldiers proudly bragging about carrying them out. A US veteran posted to the unit claimed they were flatly told by their recruiter:

“[It] was OK to kill POWs if they didn’t surrender in the strictest Geneva Convention standards.”

It may be the case that the New York Times revelations are a means of distancing Kiev’s Western backers from the actions of Ukraine’s forces. Yet, as we shall see, the proxy war’s leading sponsors had strong grounds to know precisely the nature of the government, military, and security services they were arming, funding and training long before Russia’s February 2022 invasion.

‘Intentional Strategy’

As an Al Mayadeen investigation of July 2nd made clear, Ukraine’s eight-year-long “anti-terror operation” in Donbass was a savage assault on largely defenceless residents of the breakaway Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics. The grim reality of Kiev’s abuses throughout this time was largely shielded from Western public view. Occasionally though, damaging disclosures did emerge. In 2014, Amnesty International publicised horrendous crimes committed by fascist paramilitary group Aidar Battalion in Donbass.

Next year, the organisation reported on “overwhelming evidence” of fighters and civilians taken prisoner by the Ukrainian military and security services being tortured and killed. It branded the activities of Right Sector, an ultranationalist militia at the forefront of the Maidan coup, “especially disturbing”. The group had transformed an abandoned youth camp into “an ad hoc prison,” holding dozens of civilians there as hostages, “brutally torturing them and extorting large amounts of money from them and their families.”

These revelations received meagre mainstream attention, then were promptly ignored. But the abuses continued apace. As a grisly 2016 report submitted to the OSCE starkly concluded:

“Torture and inhumane treatment inflicted by the Security Forces of Ukraine (SBU), Ukrainian armed forces, National Guard and other formations within the Interior Ministry of Ukraine, as well as by illegal armed groups, such as Right Sector, have not only continued but are gaining in scale and are becoming systematic… the extent to which torture is being used and the fact that this is done systematically prove that torture is an intentional strategy of the said institutions, authorized by their leadership.”

The report contains a panoply of deeply disturbing, and frequently difficult-to-read, first-hand testimonies of torture by the SBU and its fascist paramilitary confederates. Many of the victims claimed to be innocent civilians violently snatched off the street by gangs of armed thugs, often associated with the Neo-Nazi Azov Battalion and Right Sector, while going about their daily business. Once in Kiev’s custody, they admitted separatist supporters and fighters were subjected to hideous abuse almost without pause.

Most prisoners were “electrocuted, beaten cruelly and for multiple days in a row with different objects.” This included “iron bars, baseball bats, sticks, rifle-butts, bayonet knives, rubber batons.” “An absolute majority” reported being subject to mock firing squads, and suffered “death and rape threats to their families.” Waterboarding, strangulation, and suffocation were common. Other methods included “bone-crushing, stabbing and cutting… branding with red-hot objects, shooting different body parts with small arms.” Captured women were “frequently raped”.

All along, detainees were kept for extended periods in “freezing temperatures, with no access to food or medical assistance.” Some inmates were reportedly killed by being made to march across minefields, and run over with military vehicles. Others were “forced to take psychotropic substances,” causing them “agony.” Several reported being handcuffed to “hex bars” – weightlifting devices – and hung from ceilings. One victim of that technique reported: “I thought my bones would fall out. My hands still won’t listen to me, here and here.”

‘Risk of Retribution’

The purpose of this, on top of brutalising rebel forces and instilling fear into the civilian population of Donbass, was to secure false testimonies from prisoners. Typically, they were forced to admit to being part of the DPR and LPR defence forces, and committing grave crimes in that capacity. Others signed declarations implicating themselves as Russian assets, and/or validating the fiction that the rebels were controlled and armed by Moscow.

This of course served to reinforce Kiev’s claims its “anti-terror operation” was a righteous, legitimate crusade against Russian invaders in disguise, who were committing perverse acts of “terrorism”. And moreover, that Ukraine was successful in crushing this criminal incursion by their hostile, belligerent adversary. Nonetheless, there was another malign purpose to detaining and abusing so many innocent civilians. They could be traded for Ukrainian soldiers captured by breakaway authorities.

In June 2020, in a case brought by two Ukrainian draft dodgers seeking asylum in London, a British immigration court ruled that Kiev’s frontline forces in the “anti-terror operation” routinely committed grave war crimes. This included “unlawful capture and detention” of a “large number of civilians “with no legal or military justification… motivated by the need for ‘currency’ for prisoner exchanges” with the breakaway republics. The judgment moreover noted “systemic mistreatment of those detained by the Ukrainian military”:

“This involves torture and other conduct that is cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment contrary to Article 3 of the [European Convention on Human Rights] … There is likely to be official indifference to the mistreatment they have received. There is an attitude and atmosphere of impunity for those involved in mistreating detainees. No one has been brought to justice. Pro-Kyiv militia have been rewarded for their work by formal incorporation into the military. Lawyers are afraid of taking on cases due to the risk of retribution.”

Elsewhere, the ruling recorded that Kiev’s “adherence to the principles of distinction, precaution and proportionality when engaging with civilian targets has been poor, despite that being a task which calls for surgical precision.” This included infrastructure such as water installations, “a particular and repeated target” despite enjoying “protected status” under international humanitarian law. It further observed a “widespread civilian loss of life and the extensive destruction of residential property” in Donbass, partially attributable to “poorly targeted and disproportionate attacks carried out by the Ukrainian military.”

We can only speculate whether Kiev was tutored in torture by Western experts in the art. A February New York Times investigation revealed the very first act of Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, appointed SBU chief immediately following the Maidan coup, was to telephone the local heads of CIA and MI6, asking “for help in rebuilding the agency from the ground up, and [proposing] a three-way partnership.” This dark handshake gave rise to Ukraine’s assassination program, which US officials fear could lead to targeted killings the world over.

July 11, 2024 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

A compound crime: Israeli army hits Gaza family, uses them as human shields, and runs over their mother

Euro-Med Monitor | June 30, 2024

Palestinian Territory – The Israeli army continues to use its tanks to deliberately run over live Palestinian civilians and crush their bodies, in addition to using civilians as human shields, in the ground operations of its crime of genocide in the Gaza Strip that has been ongoing since 7 October 2023.

The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor field team documented a compound and comprehensive crime against a civilian family comprising an elderly woman and her four children, including three young women and a one-and-a-half-year-old granddaughter. The family was attacked with gunfire and bombs after Israeli forces stormed their house on Thursday evening, 27 June. They were later taken outside and detained for over three hours despite their injuries in their home, near Israeli tanks in a dangerous combat zone, where they were used as human shields. The 65-year-old mother, identified as Safiya Hassan Musa Al-Jamal, was run over by an Israeli tank and killed in front of her son.

In his testimony to the Euro-Med Monitor team, the elderly woman’s son, Muhannad Al-Jamal, 28, said: “We were living in Al-Nazaz Street in Al-Shuja’iya, east of Gaza, when at approximately 10 a.m. on Thursday we were surprised to hear the sound of shelling and explosions. We made an unsuccessful attempt to leave. All around us was chaos. We went inside, up to the first floor, and sat in a room in the center of the house. As we were sitting there, we noticed that Israeli tanks were moving closer to the area. Then the bombing started to get more intense, and I saw that many of the tanks had turned and were now positioned on the adjacent land of our neighbours, bulldozing and destroying it before raising the Israeli flag on the property. I was with my mother, my three sisters, and niece in the room. We were very careful not to make any noise. At the end of the afternoon or before sunset, the tanks began firing shells toward my brother’s ground floor flat in our home. I got my family together and we sat in one of the rooms, reciting the Shahada (a statement of belief that Muslims recite before death) and waiting to see what would happen to us.

“After sunset, we heard gunfire in the street, and then I realised that the soldiers had stormed the house after blowing up a wall. When they found us in the room, they started firing at the walls randomly and threw five bombs amid gunfire. They were shouting in Hebrew, and we did not understand what they were saying. I was hit by shrapnel in my back, along with my sisters. My mother was struck by a large piece of shrapnel in her chest while my sisters were screaming, “We are civilians.” The soldiers then moved forward one by one, yelling, “Shut up,” before dragging me away. They forced me to take off my clothes and put me against the wall. After my mother and sisters entered with a female soldier, the soldiers pointed their weapons at me for half an hour.

“They asked me to carry my mother on my back. After that, a different soldier ordered me to place her on a stretcher, so I did. I then carried her with another soldier out through the opening that the army attack had made. We then went to a nearby area and were placed in a tank, where I placed the stretcher in front of me before exiting. After that, they brought me back to the house. They later took me down and handcuffed me. My sisters were at the tank’s door when a soldier arrived at roughly 9:45 p.m. and asked them to wait before he removed the handcuffs and put shackles on my hands and a blindfold on my eyes. He stopped me on a sand hill, and he was shining a laser at me. I felt that they were going to execute me. Then he turned on the tank and ordered me to get into it. It was a different tank from the one my mother was in. Later, the tank shifted and swung around. After that, they dropped me in what appeared to be a set of stairs, and I had no idea where I was. I was asked to follow their directions as I moved. This went on for about 15 minutes while rude remarks were made. Then I was grabbed by the neck by one of the soldiers. After I moved fifty meters, they put me in yet another tank. I moved in, then they took me down and put me in a tank that contained the stretcher that we used to transport my mother. Later on, the tank moved.

“I had assumed that we would be taken to a medical facility so that my mother could be treated, but instead they tackled me and my mother, putting her on the ground. After a few minutes, I realised we had arrived at the Mushtaha Roundabout, at the end of Al-Nazzaz Street. I inquired as to my location. “Your mother will be taken by ambulance,” he said. My mom was on the ground, unconscious. There were two tanks on the right and left surrounding the roundabout. After the soldiers entered the tank, it started to move backward and ran over my mother.

“When I saw the scene, I thought I had gone insane and began to cry and scream… I fled, fearing for my life, as the tank on the right tried to run me over. However, the two tanks moved in another direction, and the tank on the left was trying to run my mother over once more, but that did not happen. Afterwards, the tanks pivoted and pointed their weapons towards me. Out of fear, I hid by taking cover. All I could hear as I started to scream was the sound of gunfire. Dogs were getting closer to my mother’s body and I shoved them away as they were going to eat her body. This was on Friday just after midnight, around 1 a.m. The soldier in the tank knew where he had placed her and was able to avoid her, but he deliberately ran over her. I could not bear the situation amid the heavy gunfire, and I could not carry my mother after the tank ran over her. I was shocked by what had happened, but I could hardly cover my mother and ran from the place, thinking if there had been an ‘ambulance,’ as he said, he would not run over her. I went looking for my sisters, as I did not know their fate. I kept crying as I walked through the intense gunfire until I came across someone on a balcony who offered me a bottle of water and directed me along a safe route that would get me to my friends’ location in a stairwell. I made every effort to get in touch with my sisters, and eventually I found out that they were receiving medical care at Baptist Hospital. They inquired about my mother, so I told them.”

His sister, Areeji, 30, added to the Euro-Med Monitor team: “When the soldiers stormed our house and started shooting and throwing bombs, we told them that my mother was injured and dying. We noticed that she had a large wound, and a female soldier arrived to provide first aid. We observed her attempting to treat her repeatedly, and I witnessed my mother on the verge of death. After they had taken my brother, they held us for a while before telling us to head to Salah al-Din Street. When we asked about my mother, they said they would take her to the hospital. Then, they gave us a green light (torch) and we started to move. We were injured and bleeding, and we had a one-and-a-half-year-old baby girl with us. When we got to the area before the Shuja’iya intersection at 11:30 p.m., there were tanks there, a lot of gunfire, and I waved the green light (torch) until we passed. No one was following us until we got to the Baptist Hospital.”

Euro-Med Monitor has previously documented many instances of the Israeli army killing Palestinian civilians by intentionally running over live civilians with military tanks.

Sixty-two-year-old Jamal Hamdi Hassan Ashour was one such victim. He was deliberately run over in Gaza City’s Al-Zaytoun neighbourhood on 29 February after he was arrested. The father of five was subjected to harsh interrogation by members of the Israeli army, who bound his hands with plastic zip-tie handcuffs before running him over with a military vehicle from the bottom to the top of his body.

Ashour’s home was targeted by Israeli aircraft, killing his nephew, before the family had to evacuate it. The incident occurred on the main Salah al-Din Street in the Zaytoun neighbourhood, according to eyewitnesses who spoke to the Euro-Med Monitor team. Israeli forces besieged Ashour and his wife inside their home, before arresting him and transferring him to a building in the neighbourhood designated for interrogating detainees. Israeli soldiers restrained the victim’s hands with plastic shackles before they crushed him, and tramped on his body from the legs up, confirming that he was alive during the incident. To guarantee thorough and complete crushing, the victim was placed on asphalt rather than on an adjacent sandy area.

Another documented incident took place on 23 January, when an Israeli tank ran over members of the Ghannam family while they were sleeping in a shelter caravan in the Taiba Towers area of Khan Younis. As a result, a man and his eldest daughter were killed, and his remaining three children and wife were injured. Amina, his 13-year-old daughter, confirmed that her father and older sister were killed when an Israeli tank unexpectedly and repeatedly ran over the caravan, where the family had been sleeping. While her mother and two other siblings survived the attack, Amina experienced extreme pressure in her eyes, nearly losing her sight.

In another incident documented by Euro-Med Monitor, Israeli tanks and bulldozers ran over and crushed displaced people inside their tents in Beit Lahia’s Kamal Adwan Hospital courtyard on 16 December 2023. Several people were killed, including individuals who were initially injured and did not ultimately survive. The corpses of those who had been previously buried in the courtyard were also crushed in the 16 December incident.

Euro-Med Monitor has also documented numerous incidents of Israeli army tanks destroying civilian property, particularly cars, during Israel’s ground incursions into different parts of the Gaza Strip. Most of these tank attacks have targeted vehicles with no evident military connection, parked in the streets, demonstrating the Israeli army’s deliberate and systematic destruction of Palestinian property.

These violations are part of a larger Israeli effort to dehumanise every Palestinian in the Gaza Strip, apparently in an attempt to justify and normalise the crimes being committed against them. Crushing civilians with tanks is just one of the many brutal ways the Israeli army murders Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, denying their humanity, suffering, and dignity. These practices reflect the intention of Israel’s government and military to collectively punish the Palestinian people, with the aim of eliminating, intimidating, and/or harming them physically and psychologically. These crimes come in tandem with a public incitement campaign by Israeli officials, media figures, and settlers calling for the annihilation of Palestinians in Gaza, and are committed with total impunity by the perpetrators—which is evident in the absence of any meaningful action by the Israeli government or military at any level to hold the perpetrators accountable.

Israeli military attacks continue in various parts of the Gaza Strip, with ongoing aerial and artillery bombardment targeting residential homes. The Israeli army has also escalated its targeted killings, and extrajudicial executions against Palestinian civilians since 7 October 2023 through direct targeting with snipers, drones, and continuing operations in various regions of the Gaza Strip. These actions against civilians amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity under the Rome Statute, and are all part of the Israeli crime of genocide that has been ongoing in the Gaza Strip since 7 October.

The widespread and indiscriminate destruction of property caused by the Israeli army, as observed in the Shujaiya neighbourhood east of Gaza City, Rafah, Khan Yunis, and Jabalia north of the Gaza Strip, affecting over 65% of the buildings, is also considered a war crime under the Rome Statute.

The international community must take immediate action to fulfil its international obligations to put an end to the crime of genocide that Israel has been committing against all Palestinians in the Gaza Strip for nine months. Measures must be taken to ensure that Israel complies with its international obligations, the Security Council’s ceasefire resolutions, and the International Court of Justice’s rulings, and to ensure Israel is held accountable for the crimes it has committed against the Palestinian people.

July 1, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , | 1 Comment

Gaza hospital chief says he was severely tortured in Israeli prisons

Al-Shifa hospital director Mohammed Abu Salmiya (2R)awaits to make a statement in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 1, 2024. (Photo by AFP)
Press TV – July 1, 2024

The director of Gaza’s al-Shifa hospital, who had been detained by Israeli forces for more than seven months, says he was put through “severe torture” during his detention in Israeli prisons.

Mohammed Abu Salmiya was among more than 50 Palestinians released and returned to Gaza, according to a medical source in the besieged territory.

Salmiya told a press conference on Monday that detainees “are subjected to all kinds of torture,” in Israel’s prisons and detention centers.

“There was almost daily torture. Cells are broken into and prisoners are beaten.”

“Several inmates died in interrogation centers and were deprived of food and medicine,” the hospital chief said.

Salmiya said the regime’s prison guards “broke his finger and caused his head to bleed during beatings, in which they used batons and dogs.”

According to him, the Israeli regime’s medical staff at different detention facilities had also taken part “in violation of all laws.”

Some Palestinian detainees, he said, had limbs amputated because of poor medical care.

Salmiya said there are still thousands of detainees held by the regime’s forces.

According to the Gaza media office, the regime forces have kidnapped at least 5,000 Palestinians since October 2023, when the military launched its bloodiest-ever war in the besieged territory.

The fate of many of them or the conditions of their detention are still unknown, said the media office.

The UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Jill Edwards, said previously that he received reports that Palestinians were being beaten, kept in cells blindfolded and handcuffed for excessive periods, deprived of sleep, and threatened with physical and sexual violence.

Other reports suggest detainees have been insulted and exposed to acts of humiliation, such as being photographed and filmed in degrading poses.

The UN expert urged the regime to allow immediate access to international human rights and humanitarian observers to all the places in which Palestinians have been detained since October.

Human rights groups have repeatedly raised the alarm about “unprecedented difficult conditions” in which all Palestinian detainees, including women, are being held. Around 80 female detainees are currently being held in the regime prisons.

July 1, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

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