Israel has had a policy of mass imprisonment of Palestinians for decades – and thousands of the prisoners are held with no charge and no trial.
Around a million Palestinians have been arrested since 1967.
And today a young man, healthy when he went into prison, was pronounced dead by the Israeli prison authorities – Mosaab Hassan Adileh from Nablus (picture above).
Mosaab was one of 64 prisoners Palestinian prisoners killed in prison since Oct 2023 – these are numbers declared by Israelis but there may have been more from Gaza as Gaza prisoners’ numbers are not in those that follow.
He was one of around 9900 Palestinian prisoners known to be inside Israeli jails on 1st April –including 29 women and 400 children. The number had roughly doubled since October 2023 – and again this doesn’t include Gaza. At least 10000 people are missing from Gaza and it isn’t known how many of them were killed and how many abducted and are still prisoners
In the West Bank and Jerusalem, Israel has made 16400 new imprisonments since Oct 2023 ; 510 of these were women and 1300 children.
Just over a third of prisoners in April (3498) were held as ‘administrative detainees’ with no charge or trial, including 4 women and 100 children. This includes 1750 described by Israel as ‘illegal fighters’ so not expected to have a trial or allowed visits or attention by the Red Cross etc. That leaves over 1700 not claimed by Israel to be fighters who were held with no charge or trial .
Issues of torture and horrendous treatment have always been there in the Israeli prisons. Since October 2023, this has become horrific. Prisoners’ stories on release are heartbreaking. They have usually lost a lot of weight due to shortage of food and they often bear signs of torture- many can scarcely walk, have broken bones, marks on their skins etc. We know that rape has been used and at least one doctor taken in Gaza died of his wounds following this horror.
(Information from the Palestinian Prisoners Committee and from Abu Dis)
Above – Israeli special forces(disguised as Arabs) capture a child.