🔗 Share this article

Based on information released by Israel, a minimum of 98 Palestinian individuals have lost their lives while detained beginning in October 2023. A rights monitoring body operating from Israel has stated that the true number is likely substantially larger, because of hundreds of disappeared people from Gaza.

Report Findings

A new investigation documented fatalities attributed to brutality, lack of healthcare, and malnutrition. Investigators utilized freedom of information requests, forensic reports, and testimonies with legal representatives, activists, relatives, and witnesses.

Official sources provided detailed statistics only for the opening period of the conflict. Throughout these months, government statistics reveal an unprecedented casualty rate among detained Palestinians, equating to a single fatality every four days.

Recent Figures

Israeli defense forces finalized data on detention fatalities for May 2024, and detention administration by September 2024. Investigators discovered an additional 35 fatalities in confinement following these periods and validated them with official sources.

Although the total number of fatalities charted being substantially larger than earlier projections, it probably does not reflect the entire scope of losses among Palestinians, as stated by the head of the prisoners and detainees department.

“Even though we are providing evidence for a greater figure of casualties than previously reported, this is not a full picture,” he explained. “We are confident that there are still people who lost their lives in detention that we don’t know about.”

Non-Combatant Fatalities

Confidential official information suggests that the majority of incarcerated Palestinians from Gaza who died in prison were civilians, per a parallel examination.

In May of this year, a armed services record monitoring all fighters in Gaza, a list of over 47,000 listed people, listed merely 21 fatalities in detention. By that point, 65 individuals from Palestine from Gaza had lost their lives in jail.

Custodial Environment

Brutality, mistreatment, and further cruelty of Palestinian individuals is now standard practice across Israel’s jail system during the duration of war. Senior officials have publicly acknowledged inadequate food and an underground jail detaining Palestinians who never see daylight.

Current and former inmates and insiders from the Israeli military have collectively claimed systemic violations of global standards.

Institutionalized Cruelty

The institutionalised cruelty was accompanied by a disturbing rise in casualties recorded across no fewer than 12 detention centers in Israel. Over ten years before the war, there were typically two or three casualties a year.

“This isn’t just an individual case sporadically. It is systemic and it will continue,” a representative stated, in part due to the fact there is a culture of virtual exemption from consequences for killing and mistreating Palestinian individuals.

Merely one incident of attacking prisoners has come to trial, with the military personnel given a penalty to 210 days. A endeavor to try additional individuals over a vicious assault involving sexual violence resulted in political demonstrations and the arrest of Israel’s senior defense attorney, with the accused individuals now demanding that allegations against them be withdrawn.

No Legal Action

“Regardless of this significant total of casualties, during 24 months no one has been detained,” the spokesperson noted. “There are no prosecutions over any killing.

“During the time these policies remain in effect, every Palestinian in detention faces risk, also the physically well individuals, including the young ones who have no underlying conditions.”

Prominent Examples

Several casualties in custody have been publicly known, including a senior hospital director who lost his life in detention after 120 days in custody.

A detainee detained alongside the victim reported that he was led to the exercise area by prison staff immediately preceding his death, obviously hurt and exposed from the hips downward. His corpse has not been returned to Gaza.

Other prisoners who lost their lives in Israeli custody are unidentified. Correctional authorities and armed services gave analysts with the total of fatalities in confinement, and limited other details such as the location where they died, but not the prisoners’ names.

Recognition Difficulties

For 21 instances, primarily detainees from Gaza, researchers were unable to match the few details provided by authorities to a fatality documented by human rights groups, either through statements from former inmates or coverage in the media.

The inmates’ next of kin could be unaware about their family members’ fatalities either, as Israel has impeded efforts to locate Palestinians it is holding. During 210 days at the start of the war, the defense forces would not provide to supply essential data about the whereabouts of numerous of individuals held in Gaza, effectively implementing a approach of forced disappearance, according to the rights monitoring body.

Insufficient Disclosure

From May 2024, officials have provided an email address for requests about detainees from Gaza, but this has led to just a modest and inadequate improvement. Researchers noted|observed|commented on