“I FELT like I was in hell, it was 35 days of torture,” Alaa Ghrayeb, apprehended by Israeli forces in Gaza while attempting to escape southward, said as he described the distressing experiences he faced during his period of detention.

Accounts collected by various media outlets from those released from Israeli jails in the past few weeks, whether as a component of the ceasefire arrangement or unconnected to it, depict a rise in instances of abuse and degradation within prison confines, during interrogations, and at the time of arrests.

“We were only in our underwear all day and night, our hands were tied, our backs and eyes blindfolded. It was freezing cold and pouring with rain. They gave us one blanket. If we needed to use toilets, our hands remained tied and we were blindfolded,” Mr Ghrayeb told TRT World.

He added more details, explaining that he, along with other detainees, was transported to the border on the day of his release.

“Approximately 500 of us, including Israeli workers, were taken to the border where gunfire erupted in the air, and we were instructed to flee,” he said.

Lama Khater, a journalist and writer residing in Hebron and a mother of five children, was taken into custody on October 26 at her residence in the Loza area, west of Hebron.

Ms Khater, blindfolded and handcuffed, was led by a female soldier to an interrogation room the day she was arrested.

“The interrogator yelled at me... saying ‘You should know that there are 20 soldiers in this room — I will ask them to rape you right here.”

Published in Dawn, December 20th, 2023