GAZA, (PIC)
The Ministry of Detainees and Ex-detainees in the Gaza Strip has said that the number of prisoners who have been martyred in Israeli occupation jails because of inhumane detention conditions rose to 54 martyrs.
The ministry explained in a statement on Thursday evening that 36 Gazan prisoners have died due to torture and systematic beating they have been subjected to over the course of the ongoing genocide war on Gaza for more than eight months.
The statement pointed out that the tally of Palestinian prisoners who have been arrested since the beginning of the genocide war has risen to 9,000 including 300 women, 635 children and 80 journalists.
The ministry stressed that the Israeli occupation forces (IOF) persist in committing heinous crimes against Palestinian prisoners, most notably the crime of enforced disappearance.
It added that Israeli prisons have become mass graves of thousands of prisoners, amid shameful silence of international institutions such as the Red Cross.
The Palestinian detainees are held inside small prison sections with rooms turned into isolation cells, a limited number of beds compared to the number of prisoners which sometimes reaches 15 prisoners in one room, forcing most of them to sleep on the floor due to overcrowding.
According to testimonies by some recently released detainees, Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails are subjected to various forms of torture and inhumane and degrading treatment, the statement highlighted.
The ministry listed some of these oppressive practices, such as forcibly and repeatedly stripping detainees, shackling their hands and legs, covering their eyes for long hours, shocking them with electricity, and starving them.
Other methods of torture include preventing detainees from sitting down or standing up by fixing them to chairs or hanging them down while shackled and restrained and drilling their bodies with a sharp tool, depriving them of sleep, bathing, and medical care, letting police dogs attack them, and exposing them to low temperatures, the ministry added.
Another form of psychological torture is calling on Israeli officials and civilians to come and watch the torture process as means of insult and humiliation.
The ministry concluded its statement by condemning in the strongest terms these serious violations against Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, urging all human rights and international organizations to denounce such practices and to visit Israeli prisons and investigation centers to investigate these violations and brutal crimes.
The ministry stressed the need to pressure the IOF to stop these offences immediately and to hold the Israeli officials, who are responsible for committing crimes against humanity, accountable before international courts.
