Monitor: Israel systematically designing prisons for torture

Israel is torturing Palestinian prisoners and detainees, depriving them of their most basic human rights at an underground prison in the city of Ramla, a Geneva-based independent organization for the protection of human rights says.

In a new report, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor said the appalling humanitarian condition of prisoners and detainees at the center gravely violates the international standards for detention conditions.

"This prison serves as an example of the systematic Israeli policy of designing prisons and detention facilities to serve as instruments of torture, punishment, and maltreatment through the layout and form of the cells or detention rooms and the amenities provided within," it said.

The group cited video clips released by the Israeli media that displayed Palestinian detainees and prisoners chained inside underground cells without mattresses or blankets, enclosed by iron gates, and not exposed to sunlight.

Israel's establishment of the underground prison proves that the regime’s prisons and detention centers are specifically “designed to torture Palestinian detainees”, it said. 

Also, Israel's decision to display images of prisoners and detainees in appalling conditions exhibits the regime’s “disdain for the global justice system”, the group said. 

It said the Israeli claim that the prison is reserved for the "most dangerous detainees" does not excuse the violation of international law's regulations regarding the treatment of detainees and prisoners.

"This claim is untrue and frequently used as a pretext for torture and retaliation, as evidenced by the fact that thousands of detainees from the Gaza Strip were released after being subjected to cruel torture and unlawful detention conditions under the pretext of elite membership."

According to the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, there are at least 30 prisons and detention centers with the same horrific conditions.

Additionally, the group said, the Israeli regime has set up a number of detention camps with the same appalling conditions since the start of its war on the Gaza Strip in October 2023.

It cited the Sde Teiman military base's detention center which has been compared in its horrendous condition to the notorious Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo prisons run by the United States.

The group urged the international community to carry out its legal responsibilities in order to prevent the genocidal treatment of Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli regime, not only in detention camps and prisons, but also across Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

According to international human rights groups, in addition to thousands of Gaza residents whose numbers or detention locations are unknown and who have been forcibly disappeared, the Israeli regime is detaining over 10,400 Palestinian prisoners and detainees in their prisons.

Since the inception of the Israeli war on Gaza in October 2023, more than 46,500 people have been killed, most of them children and women. Gaza’s 2.3 million population has also been displaced and much of the besieged territory is in ruins.

This "is a logical outcome of a long history of impunity made possible by the complete impunity that Israel enjoys from the United States of America and many European governments," the monitor said. 

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