New sexual assault allegation against Palestinian detainee at Israeli jail

A shocking new case of sexual abuse by Israeli prison guards is being investigated by police, the latest in a series of accusations of torture and ill-treatment against Palestinian detainees at the hands of Israeli authorities.

A Palestinian man held in Israel’s Ketziot prison has been subjected to repeated violence and torture by Israeli guards while in custody, the detainee’s lawyer said.

The man, who is only being identified as 'S', is from the occupied West Bank town of Qalqilya and was first sentenced in 2004 for allegedly belonging to the military wing of Hamas.

Lawyer Weaam Baloum said that S had been "repeatedly tortured and humiliated" since the outbreak of the Gaza war last October.

The prisoner was sexually abused and violently hit by guards who jumped on his back and inserted objects into his anus, according to a report in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

On other occasions, he was beaten by several officers, forced to undress and again sexually assaulted. The man said other prisoners have also suffered serious sexual assault.

Baloum said S is in a frail mental and physical condition and called on the police and Israel Prison Service to investigate the allegations. The prison service told Haaretz that the complaint is being investigated.

The reports come against a backdrop of mounting testimonies of alleged serious abuse of Palestinian prisoners at the hands of Israeli authorities.

Last month, a video emerged of Israeli officers abusing a detainee at the Sde Teiman detention facility in the Negev desert where dozens of Palestinians from Gaza are being held. Horrific stories of abuse at the facility have been leaked by Israeli whistleblowers, including soldiers and physicians, as well as released Palestinians.

An investigation by US outlet CNN found that men were being put in stress positions, having limbs amputated and forced to wear diapers.

Since 7 October, at least 36 Palestinians have died in the facility, which are thought to have occurred due to the denial of vital medical attention and abuse, according to Palestinian rights groups.

For months, Palestinian authorities have been calling on the international community to intervene over the reports of ill-treatment, including several released prisoners who have left custody looking emaciated.

In June, 77 year old Palestinian politician Aziz Dweik was freed from Naqab prison in an emaciated state having been arbitrarily detained in Hebron in October. He said the prison was “worse than Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo”.

Israel has blocked prison visits from the International Committee of the Red Cross since October, despite the organisation having an internationally recognised mandate to support the rights of detainees.

A report from the UN Human Rights Office earlier this year expressed major concern over what it said was Israel’s systemic policy of “incommunicado detention” of prisoners.

It also raised alarm at the growing accounts of torture, including water-boarding and the use of electric shocks.

Last month, Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem published a detailed report outlining what it said was Israel’s systemic abuse and torture of Palestinians held in its prisons.

Rights groups say the abuse has surged since the Gaza war with Israeli guards “waging a war of revenge” on the prisoners.