FALCON POWERS – The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights reported in a 23-page report that thousands of Palestinians were forcibly removed from Gaza, and sometimes detained in bomb shelters, and then taken to detention centers in Israel where some were tortured and dozens died.
The report, based primarily on interviews with released detainees and other victims and witnesses, said that many of those detained in Gaza since the start of the war on October 7th were taken at checkpoints as they fled the Israeli military assault or in the schools and hospitals where they had sought refuge. The report said the detainees were often blindfolded and handcuffed before being transported to Israel and placed in military detention centers “akin to cages” where they were forced to remain naked for long periods wearing only diapers.
The UN report stated that 53 detainees died in custody.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said in a statement accompanying the report, “The testimonies gathered by my office and others point to a range of horrific acts, such as torture by means of waterboarding and the use of dogs against detainees, and other actions, in gross violation of international human rights law and international humanitarian law.”
Türk called for the immediate release of the detainees as well as the remaining 253 hostages captured by the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in the October 7th attack that Israel says also left 1,200 people dead.
The Israeli military said it is investigating claims of mistreatment of detainees at facilities in Israel, but declined to comment on specific cases. The military plans to gradually phase out the Sde Terumah military detention center in the Negev desert, which both the UN report and a Palestinian rights group identified as a site of detainee abuse.
