B'Tselem בצלם بتسيلم@btselem
One of the thousands of Palestinians that Israel is holding in its torture camps is Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, a pediatrician and the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip. Dr. Abu Safiya has been in prison for more than 550 days. His lawyer, who visited him last week, warned that he believes Dr. Abu Safiya’s life is in imminent danger.
Physicians for Human Rights-Israel reported that Dr. Abu Safiya, who is in solitary confinement in the underground Rakefet facility, met them bearing fresh signs of violence so severe that he was barely recognizable. He struggled to sit, had difficulty breathing and appeared on the verge of passing out. Dr. Abu Safiya told his lawyer he feared this would be their last meeting before he was killed.
The Israeli military arrested Dr. Abu Safiya in December 2024, after he refused for a long time to leave the hospital and insisted on staying with his patients and medical team under Israeli siege and bombardment. He has been in Israeli custody ever since, without charges or a release date. Last month, the Israeli High Court of Justice rejected an appeal he filed against the extension of his detention, without releasing its reasons for a decision that may cost him his life.
Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya is not alone. Israel is holding thousands of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip in its incarceration facilities, including 13 other physicians, as well as Palestinians from the West Bank and Palestinian citizens of Israel. Testimonies given to B’Tselem by survivors of these facilities, together with extensive information published by Palestinian, Israeli and international human rights organizations, show that since October 2023 Israel’s incarceration facilities have become a network of torture camps for Palestinians.
Inmates in these facilities are subjected to ongoing physical and psychological abuse, systematic starvation, sleep deprivation, denial of medical care, humiliation and sexual assault.
According to B’Tselem’s monitoring, at least 90 Palestinians have died in these incarceration facilities since October 2023, as a result of the conditions.
The torture and inhuman treatment suffered by Palestinian prisoners are not aberrations or the actions of a few individuals. They are the implementation of the brutal policies Itamar Ben Gvir, the minister in charge of the prison system, shamelessly espouses, policies that could not be applied without support from Israel’s judicial system, which is fully cognizant of what’s happening behind prison walls, or the Israeli public.
The international community also chooses to look the other way, granting Israel immunity from accountability for the crimes it commits against Palestinians. Instead, it must demand that Israel end the torture, killing and human rights violations it perpetrates in its incarceration camps and throughout the territories under its control.
Read more about Israel’s torture camps in B’Tselem’s reports “Welcome to Hell” and “Living Hell” on B’Tselem’s website:
btselem.org/publications/2…
btselem.org/publications/2…