New Report Details ‘Horrific’ Torture of Palestinian Detainees in Gaza

The testimonies confirm the Israeli use of physical and psychological torture against Palestinian civilian detainees, including “beatings with the intent to kill, sexual violence, electrocution, blindfolding, and long-term hand and foot shackles”, the Geneva-based group said, Al-Jazeera reported.

“Israel also denied them access to food and medical care, including critical and life-saving care, spat and urinated on detainees, and committed other cruel and degrading acts,” it said.

Earlier this month, Israeli whistleblowers exposed appalling and inhumane conditions at the Sde Teiman military base that also serves as a detention center in the Negev desert in the Southern part of the occupied territories.

Three Israeli individuals who worked at the base, in which Palestinians are detained amid the genocidal war on besieged Gaza, said doctors at the facility have occasionally amputated prisoners’ limbs and performed medical procedures they were not qualified to conduct.

The whistleblowers, who risk legal repercussions and reprisals from groups supportive of the Tel Aviv’s onslaught on Gaza, described detainees held under extreme physical restraint.

“Rows of men in gray tracksuits are seen sitting on paper-thin mattresses, ringfenced by barbed wire. All appear blindfolded, their heads hanging heavy under the glare of floodlights,” said the report, citing whistleblowers.

“We were told they were not allowed to move. They should sit upright. They’re not allowed to talk. Not allowed to peek under their blindfold,” the whistleblowers said.

Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after Palestinian resistance groups carried out a surprise retaliatory operation into the occupied territories.

Concomitantly with the war, Israel has been enforcing a near-total siege on the coastal territory, which has reduced the flow of foodstuffs, medicine, electricity, and water into the Palestinian territory into a trickle.

So far during the military onslaught, Israel has killed at least 35,700 Gazans, most of them women, children, and adolescents. Another 79,990 Palestinians have sustained injuries as well.