🔗 Share this article

Per figures released by Israel, a minimum of 98 Palestinian individuals have died during detention since October 2023. A rights monitoring body based in Israel has indicated that the actual figure is probably significantly greater, because of many of missing people originating in Gaza.

Study Results

A new investigation recorded fatalities attributed to physical violence, medical neglect, and malnutrition. Analysts employed freedom of information requests, medical examiner documents, and discussions with attorneys, activists, next of kin, and observers.

Government bodies provided detailed statistics limited to the first eight months of the hostilities. Throughout these months, government statistics indicate an record casualty rate among detained Palestinians, equating to a life lost each 96 hours.

Updated Statistics

Official armed forces finalized records on deaths in detention for May 2024, and the prison service during September 2024. Researchers identified an additional 35 fatalities in confinement after these periods and confirmed them with official sources.

Despite the total number of fatalities documented being significantly higher than earlier projections, it probably omits the full scale of Palestinian casualties, according to the leader of the detainee affairs unit.

“Even though we are providing evidence for a greater figure of deaths than earlier indicated, this is not the entire story,” he said. “We are confident that there are even now detainees who died in custody that we have not identified.”

Non-Combatant Fatalities

Confidential government records shows that the largest portion of incarcerated Palestinians from Gaza who died in prison were ordinary citizens, based on a parallel investigation.

In May of this year, a armed services record tracking all combatants in Gaza, a registry of more than 47,000 listed people, recorded just 21 fatalities in detention. By that date, 65 Palestinians from Gaza had died in detention.

Custodial Environment

Assault, mistreatment, and additional maltreatment of Palestinians has been normalised across Israel’s detention facilities throughout 24 months of hostilities. Senior officials have openly admitted minimal sustenance and an subterranean prison detaining Palestinians who are denied sunlight.

Present and past detainees and whistleblowers from the armed services have collectively claimed routine infractions of international law.

Systemic Abuse

The institutionalised cruelty was accompanied by a troubling surge in casualties recorded across at least 12 detention centers in Israel. During the previous decade before the hostilities, there were typically two or three fatalities a year.

“This isn’t only a single occurrence here and there. It is systemic and it will continue,” an official commented, partially because there is a climate of almost complete immunity for fatalities and maltreatment of detainees.

Just one case of beating prisoners has come to trial, with the soldier handed a punishment to 210 days. An attempt to prosecute others over a vicious assault featuring assault caused right-wing protests and the arrest of Israel’s top military lawyer, with the suspects now demanding that indictments against them be withdrawn.

Absence of Consequences

“Regardless of this mass number of fatalities, throughout the conflict not one individual has faced arrest,” the spokesperson stated. “There have been no charges over any fatality.

“As long as these practices continue to be enforced, every Palestinian in detention faces risk, including the physically well individuals, even the young ones who have no underlying conditions.”

Notable Incidents

Several casualties in custody have been high profile, such as a 50-year-old hospital director who lost his life in detention after four months in detention.

A prisoner detained alongside the individual stated that he was led to the exercise area by correctional officers just prior to his passing, visibly injured and naked from the waist down. His corpse remains unreleased to Gaza.

Other prisoners who perished in detention in Israel are unidentified. The prison service and military gave analysts with the figure of deaths in custody, and basic additional information including the location where they died, but excluding the prisoners’ names.

Recognition Difficulties

For 21 instances, primarily detainees from Gaza, analysts could not to match the few details provided by authorities to a fatality documented by human rights groups, via accounts from former inmates or accounts in the press.

The prisoners’ relatives could be unaware about their relatives’ casualties as well, as Israel has made it difficult to monitor Palestinian individuals it is holding. For seven months at the outset of the hostilities, the armed services refused to provide fundamental details about the status of numerous of people held in Gaza, in effect enacting a practice of forced disappearance, per the human rights group.

Insufficient Disclosure

From May 2024, government bodies have created an electronic contact for inquiries about Palestinian individuals from Gaza, but this has provided only a incomplete and restricted betterment. Investigators noted|observed|commented on