The total number of female detainees has risen to 88, including two minors and three women in the early stages of pregnancy
RAMALLAH — Female Palestinian detainees in Israeli rape and torture dungeons are being subjected to horrific abuse, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society (PPS) has revealed. The total number of female detainees has risen to 88, including two minors and three women in the early stages of pregnancy. The latter were “recently arrested on charges related to alleged incitement.”
PPS noted a significant escalation in repressive operations against the detainees at Damon Prison, where the inmates were subjected to at least ten violent raids throughout March and April. “These raids included severe beatings, forcing the prisoners to lie on the ground, tying their hands behind their backs, and deliberately assaulting them while restrained by both male and female guards,” PPS noted. “This resulted in bruises and various injuries among several prisoners.”
Moreover, the Israelis have drastically intensified isolation policies. “At least six female prisoners were subjected to solitary confinement, including some who remained in isolation for more than two weeks,” the report added.
The detainees also have to deal with overcrowded cells and starvation — a consistent feature across all Israeli dungeons in occupied Palestine. Due to the policy of providing inmates with the bare minimum of food supplies, one detainee lost around 30 kg of body weight in detention.
“Prisoners also pointed to severe overcrowding in the cells, especially amid the escalation of systematic and ongoing arrest campaigns,” the PPS report revealed. “Some cells now hold more than ten prisoners, many of whom are forced to sleep on the floor. Starvation has also emerged as one of the most prominent themes repeatedly mentioned in prisoners’ testimonies, especially during the occupation’s official holidays. One prisoner lost around 30 kg after several months of detention.”
The report noted that strip searches have become routine, especially since the start of the genocide in the Gaza Strip, and that they constitute a form of sexual abuse. “Strip searches are considered among the most widespread practices and constitute a form of sexual assault carried out against prisoners of both sexes.”
Furthermore, the detainees are denied medical treatment despite suffering from chronic illnesses, including “two prisoners with cancer who are being denied treatment amid a continuous deterioration in their health conditions.”
Most of the detainees have been abducted on frivolous charges, such as “incitement” and placed under administrative detention, under which the prosecution does not even need to provide any evidence of wrongdoing. In a true Kafkaesque fashion, the state merely declares that all such proof is contained in a “secret file” to which the detainee and their lawyers have no access.
The PPS report added that conditions inside Israeli dungeons have become unbearable since the start of the Gaza genocide, and repression policies only continue to escalate:
It is worth noting that, in the aftermath of the genocide, the Israeli occupation prison system imposed unprecedented conditions inside prisons by entrenching a structural torture regime based on starvation, mistreatment, and assaults in various forms, including sexual assault, in addition to creating conditions that contributed to the spread of diseases and epidemics. This was accompanied by organised policies aimed at depriving prisoners of contact with the outside world and isolating them, as well as by the continued ban on family visits.
Nearly 100 Palestinian detainees have been killed by the Israelisin their dungeons through a combination of severe torture, including beatings and starvation. The youngest victim of Israeli barbarism in its dungeons was merely 17 years old. A fit athlete, Walid Khaled Abdullah Ahmad was beaten and starved to deathmonths after his abduction from his home in the West Bank.
The practice of raping Palestinian prisoners has also been extensively documented. The Israelis, who have left no stone unturned in displaying the full range of their bottomless sadism, have deployed dogs to rape Palestinians. A report published last month detailed multiple accounts of violent rape.
In the absence of concerted international advocacy for the release of Palestinian detainees, whose numbers currently stand at more than 9,400, there appears to be little hope of their release, as they are forced to endure horrific abuse every day they remain incarcerated. — Palestine Will Be Free
