“Taken Hostage by the Israeli Military”: Freed Palestinian Prisoners Describe Widespread Torture

AMY GOODMAN: As we turn now to Khan Younis, we’re joined by Moureen Kaki, head of mission for Glia International, a medical solidarity organization that sent doctors to Gaza. Moureen has been in Gaza since June of last year. She’s recently been assisting international doctors with translation for Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli jails.

This is one newly released Palestinian, Majed Abid, who was detained nearly two years ago.

MAJED ABID: [translated] The situation is extremely, extremely hard for young men — no food, no drink, no medical care. They face constant oppression, torment. I wish everyone would pay attention to their situation. May God protect everyone. Thank God. It’s an indescribable feeling.

AMY GOODMAN: So, Moureen Kaki, if you can talk about the people you have translated for? What is very clear from the images we’re seeing of Palestinians who have been released from Israeli prisons — what, some 1,700, apparently, in Gaza, more released in the occupied West Bank — is how thin they are, almost skeletal, though they are all wearing those heavy gray sweatshirts. Describe the experiences that you have heard of these people.

MOUREEN KAKI: Yeah, Amy, it was really, really tragic to listen to the things that they had to share. Some of the — I mean, some of it, they didn’t have to share. Some of it was visually represented on their bodies in the way you were describing. But three folks that we saw and talked to, in particular, had fresh gunshot wounds from as late as three weeks ago, that were in — all in their leg, in their thigh. It was like the same place.

They had — every single one that I spoke to had described the same experience of the fact that since the ceasefire was announced, they were only allowed toilet water to drink. They were not given any food. Some were beat by Israeli forces as early as two hours before their arrival into Gaza while they were waiting on the bus. Everybody described torture, both, like, brutal sort of beatings to different parts of their body, but also sort of, quote-unquote, “soft” forms of torture, where they were forced to kneel or sit in an uncomfortable position for several, several hours at a time. It was — yeah, it was really — it was really horrifying, what they had to share.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Moureen, if you could give us some details? Who are the prisoners that you’ve been talking to? What kinds of facilities were they held in? And were most of them held under administrative detention? Had they been charged? Had there been a — or, were they just awaiting trial?

MOUREEN KAKI: Yeah, thank you for that question. So, none of them had been charged. This was all — actually, they were all being illegally detained, like under the practice that you named, Israel’s administrative detention, which — and they all described the fact that they were not given any kind of lawyer. They weren’t given any kind of communication to the outside world. And, in fact, Israeli — and prisoners were telling some folks that their whole family had been killed, and in some cases that wasn’t true. In some cases, they just didn’t get any news at all, and they came back to learn that their family had indeed been killed by Israel.

And so, these are people who — I mean, there was a range of folks. There were — there were young men as young as 21 years old, I explicitly remember, and then elder men as old as mid to late fifties. And most of the people that I spoke to were just taken from their homes after their homes had been attacked by Israeli fire at some point, and then they were either injured or disoriented and taken from their homes or the places that they were when they were attacked. And so, yeah, yeah, I mean, there’s no — there’s no — they’re captives. They were taken hostage by the Israeli military.

AMY GOODMAN: So, again, of these well over a thousand men, close to 2,000, were not charged, the ones that were released in Gaza.

MOUREEN KAKI: No, no, they were being illegally imprisoned as captives by the Israeli military and then the Israeli government.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: And where were they held, Moureen?

MOUREEN KAKI: There were different prisons that they were at in occupied Palestine and in Israel. The conditions under which they were held — so, scabies was so rampant in imprisoned Palestinians that the Ministry of Health had actually prepared care packages that included scabies treatment for everyone, because that’s how much of a blanket problem it was. So, they were held in confined, cramped spaces, where other Palestinians, like you guys had mentioned before, from the West Bank, are also held under administrative detention, including children.

AMY GOODMAN: One of the men that we just showed, who was weeping on the ground on his knees, had just learned that his wife and children had been killed in an Israeli airstrike. He was holding a little bracelet he had for, I believe, his 2-year-old. Had they had any information, as they were being held, about what was happening on the ground?

MOUREEN KAKI: They were not — the gentleman you’re talking about, actually, he was one of the first people to come through. I was in the room when he received the news. And they were not — I asked them — actually, one of the things I was doing was offering my cellphone so they could call their families. And often, because there were so many people in the area, and because Israel had ruined the infrastructure, it was hard to get cell reception. And so, they told me, “Can I send a message? And if they call you back once I leave, can you just tell them that I’m physically OK and that I will find them?” So, there was no communication being allowed to happen at all, at all, in the entire time that they were held captive. Some of them were held captive for as little as three months, and some of them for several years.

AMY GOODMAN: Moureen Kaki, we just want to end by asking why you are there. You are head of mission for Glia International. You’ve been in Gaza for well over a year. You actually come from Texas.

MOUREEN KAKI: Yeah, I’m Palestinian American, and so this is a personal struggle for me in the sense of, you know, our people are one people, whether it’s the West Bank, where I’m from, or in Gaza or in occupied Palestine, and so that it matters to me that I can serve my people in this way, even if it’s as small as it is.

But the other thing is that I am a taxpaying American citizen, and I feel absolutely disgusted by the fact that our country continues to use taxpayer dollars to fund Israel’s occupation and violence against Palestinians. And so, for me, it was an easy decision to try to do this kind of work to kind of — not to offset the violence that I contributed to financially in the U.S., but to find some way that I could ease my own guilt in that sense. And yeah, it’s been — it’s been the greatest honor of my life to be able to be here in Gaza and do the little that I can to help.

AMY GOODMAN: Moureen Kaki is head of mission for Glia International. She is speaking to us from Gaza.

Coming up, as the U.S. government shutdown enters its 16th day, the Trump administration is giving a $20 billion bailout to Argentina’s right-wing President Javier Milei. Stay with us.

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AMY GOODMAN: “Souty” by Tunisian American Emel Mathlouthi, performing in our Democracy Now! studio. You can watch her full performance and interview at democracynow.org.