Medical workers taken from Gaza to Israeli detention centres were subjected to widespread torture, psychological abuse, medical neglect and the provision of insufficient food rations, Al Jazeera reports citing a report by the Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI).

The Israeli monitor has based its report on testimonies provided by 24 detainees to PHRI lawyers during visits to military detention centres or Israel Prison Service facilities, according to The Times of Israel newspaper.

“I was suspended by my wrists from the ceiling, my legs forced backward and left in that position for hours. They humiliated me and spat on me … during the interrogation in Ofer Prison, they extinguished cigarettes on my head and poured coffee over me. I was brutally beaten,” said a 38-year-old nurse who is still incarcerated.

Dr Khaled Alser, a 32-year-old surgeon who worked at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, stated that after being detained in Gaza, soldiers transporting him and other detainees “humiliated and beat us, sitting on us, kicking us with their boots, and striking us with their rifle barrels. We begged them to stop, but they continued.”