DaysofPal – A leading Palestinian human rights organization said that Israel is running a “systematic and organized practice of sexual torture” against detainees from the Gaza Strip, revealing harrowing accounts of rape, assault, and psychological humiliation inside Israeli detention centers.
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) released the findings following interviews with men and women recently freed from Israeli custody. Survivors described brutal methods of physical and sexual torture, including rape, forced stripping, assault using objects and animals, electrocution, and the filming of abuse.
“These testimonies confirm the existence of a deliberate and institutionalized policy targeting the bodies and dignity of Palestinian detainees,” PCHR said, adding that such crimes amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity under international law.
“I Wished for Death Every Moment”
Among the testimonies, a 42-year-old woman detained at an Israeli checkpoint in northern Gaza in November 2024 recounted days of repeated rape, electrocution, and beatings.
“They put me on a metal table, pressed my chest and head against it, cuffed my hands to the end of the bed, and pulled my legs apart forcefully,” she said. “I felt a man raping me. I was blindfolded and screaming while they beat me on my back and head. I could hear a camera; I believe they were filming me.”
Another former prisoner, a 35-year-old father arrested during a raid on Al-Shifa Hospital in March 2024, told investigators that he was raped by a dog inside the Sde Teiman military camp after weeks of humiliation, stripping, and beatings.
“The soldiers took us to an area away from the cameras and set dogs on us,” he said. “The dog penetrated me while they sprayed pepper spray in our faces and kept hitting us. I lost control from the pain and humiliation.”
He sustained a head wound requiring seven stitches, several fractures, and deep psychological trauma.
Sde Teiman: A Site of Torture and Impunity
The Sde Teiman military detention center has become synonymous with torture since video footage leaked in August 2024 showed Israeli soldiers assaulting a Palestinian detainee, including anal rape. The man suffered broken ribs, a punctured lung, and severe rectal injuries.
Although five soldiers were charged with aggravated abuse, none were detained or placed under legal restrictions, according to Israeli media.
Israel’s military advocate general, Yifat Tomer Yerushalmi, was arrested on unrelated charges of fraud, obstruction of justice, and misuse of classified information after he leaked the video showing the abuse.
A 41-year-old man detained while displaced at Kamal Adwan Hospital described being raped with a wooden stick while tied and blindfolded. “From sheer anguish I lost consciousness,” he told PCHR. “A female officer eventually ordered them to stop.”
Another survivor, an 18-year-old arrested near a humanitarian aid distribution point, said soldiers forced him and others to kneel while they were assaulted with a bottle in repeated group attacks.
“They destroyed our dignity and our hope for life,” he said. “I had wanted to continue my education; now I am lost.”
A Pattern, Not an Exception
According to PCHR, these are not isolated incidents but part of a “systematic policy of sexualized violence” within Israel’s wider campaign against Gaza’s population. The group said it has documented extensive sexual torture of both men and women over the past two years.
Under the October ceasefire deal, Israel released 1,700 Palestinian detainees from Gaza, many of whom had been held indefinitely without charge or trial. However, around 1,000 others remain in Israeli custody, including in military camps and prisons closed to international monitoring bodies such as the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
A recent Guardian investigation found that detainees from Gaza are being kept in total isolation inside an underground facility where they never see daylight, survive on minimal food, and are denied contact with their families.
The revelations have provoked alarm among international human rights advocates and deep concern within Israel’s own establishment. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged that the Sde Teiman case had caused “immense damage” to Israel’s global image.
“This is perhaps the most severe public relations attack that the state of Israel has experienced since its establishment,” Netanyahu said in November.
For survivors, however, the damage runs far deeper, physical, psychological, and irreversible.
One former detainee told PCHR simply: “They violated our bodies and our humanity. Even if we are released, the prison remains inside us.”
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