What Happens Inside Israel’s Detention System — Bird's Eye View

[0:00] At Zedetayman, I went through the hardest days of my life. I'm still suffering from severe trauma. [0:06] They held me naked and soldiers set dogs on me that attacked me. They beat me on a penis, [0:12] tied it with a plastic cord and caused swelling and bleeding. [0:17] Israeli forces detained a Palestinian man we're calling SS in March 2024. They sent him to the [0:23] notorious Zedetayman military prison, known for its brutality and torture of Palestinian detainees. [0:29] SS is one of thousands of Palestinians detained by Israeli forces since October 2023. Human [0:35] rights groups estimate that at least 21,000 have been arrested in the occupied West Bank [0:39] and East Jerusalem, with thousands more taken from Gaza. They say many have experienced severe abuse [0:45] while in Israeli custody. Beatings, starvation, sexual violence, rape. Israeli authorities deny this, [0:52] but testimonies collected by rights groups, UN investigators, and Palestinian and Israeli [0:57] lawyers raised serious questions about what is really happening inside Israeli prisons, [1:02] detention centers, and other holding facilities. In an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera, [1:06] UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese spoke about the findings of her latest report, [1:11] Torture and Genocide, ahead of presenting it to the United Nations Human Rights Council on March 23rd. [1:17] When I say that torture in Palestinian has become part of the Israeli posture toward them, [1:23] I'm not being hyperbolic. When you see rabbis inciting to commit heinous acts such as sexual violence and torture, [1:37] when you have a national parliament debating and defending the right to torture Palestinians, [1:47] when you see soldiers really taking pride and making fun of mistreating another life, another human being, [1:59] it's a portrayal of the moral decay of that society. You may have seen some of the images she's talking [2:07] about on social media, but the real story behind comments like these is much darker. [2:12] A warning. What you're about to see and hear may be disturbing. Let's take a look at where, [2:17] according to testimonies and investigations by human rights groups like Adamir and B'Tselem, [2:22] these atrocities are happening. This map shows just how many Israeli prisons and detention centers [2:27] there are, stretching from the Negev Desert, to prisons inside Israel, to military detention sites [2:32] in the occupied West Bank. In some cases, satellite images also show the expansion of detention sites [2:38] since October 2023, which have increasingly become the focus of growing international scrutiny. [2:43] We'll start with the Sidita Iman military detention facility. Situated in the Negev, near the border [2:49] with the occupied Ghazda Strip, it looks like any other Israeli military base. Concrete walls, [2:54] watchtowers, fences crowned with barbed wire. But since October 2023, there's been an increasing [3:00] number of Palestinians held here saying they've been beaten, sexually assaulted and tortured. [3:06] Brutality has escalated to an unprecedented level after October 7. It has become vindictive. It has [3:14] become really part of the staple menu of the custodial practices. A February 2026 report by the [3:21] Committee to Protect Journalists documented the treatment of Palestinian reporters detained by [3:25] Israeli forces. The CPJ interviewed 59 journalists from Ghazza, who had been released from Israeli detention [3:31] between October 2023 and January 2026. Twenty of them had been held here, in Sidita Iman, [3:38] for all or part of their detention. Of the 59 journalists, all but one said they had been [3:43] subjected to torture, sexual assault or other violence while in custody. One former detainee, [3:49] Osama Syed, said he and other prisoners were forced to strip naked and were then sexually assaulted [3:55] by trained military dogs inside Sidita Iman. He described the dog attack as rape, saying, [4:00] soldiers laughed and recorded the sexual assault. Another former detainee, who asked to remain [4:05] anonymous, said soldiers cut off the blood flow to his genitals using plastic zip ties and beat him [4:11] so severely that he could not urinate without passing blood. He said Israeli soldiers told him that, [4:16] once they were through, he would no longer be a man. And then there's Offer Prison, in the occupied West [4:22] Bank. Of the 59 journalists interviewed in the CPJ report, 30 were held here, including Mohammed Al-Atrush. [4:28] In November 2023, he says he and dozens of other prisoners were subjected to a coordinated assault, [4:34] what he describes as mass punishment. He says guards unleashed trained dogs to attack them, [4:39] while they were beaten with metal rods to inflict wounds intended to cause prolonged bleeding and [4:44] scars. Accounts like these appear repeatedly across survivor testimonies. We've also been speaking to [4:49] Palestinian and Israeli rights groups that document these cases. Based on survivor testimony and Israeli [4:55] whistleblowers, Palestinian detainees held in Israeli military bases, police stations, [5:00] detention centers, and prisons were subjected to the following. Severe beatings, stress positions, [5:05] prolonged shackling, denial of food and medical care, and sexual assault. We're now going to talk [5:11] about allegations that involve sexual violence and the deliberate targeting of detainees' genitals. [5:16] We poured through survivor testimonies and interviews with human rights groups. They describe a [5:20] pattern of abuse that includes forced nudity during interrogations, beatings focused on genitals, [5:26] threats of rape, and in many cases, sexual assault. And investigators, including the UN Special [5:32] Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, say these assaults go beyond sexual crimes. In many cases, it's sexualized [5:38] torture, abuse meant to dominate and punish detainees. Sexual violence has served a specific purpose. [5:45] It's brutal. If it's used against women or men, it doesn't differentiate. But the way it's been used [5:58] against men really gives the idea of wanting to break the spirit of these people so that they do not [6:08] procreate anymore. Torture of Palestinian detainees is not new. Human rights organizations have been [6:14] documenting allegations of torture in Israeli detention from before the early 2000s, even after [6:19] the 1999 Israeli Supreme Court ruling. In that case, the court's decision was meant to limit the use of [6:25] moderate physical pressure during interrogations, but it still allowed for exceptions whenever necessity [6:30] dictated. Since October 2023, the scale and severity of these allegations of torture have increased sharply. [6:37] Nothing of this is really new. Not the torture, not the brutal methods. What is different and what is new [6:47] is the scale, the intensity, and the sadism with which these acts are perpetrated, these crimes are committed. [6:58] What's more, many of these allegations of abuse involve facilities where Palestinians are held under [7:03] something called administrative detention, meaning without charge or trial. That's where serious legal [7:10] questions begin to emerge. And while administrative detention may be legally murkier, torture is [7:15] explicitly illegal under international law, primarily through the UN Convention Against Torture. It's a rule [7:21] with no exceptions, not in wartime, not in an emergency, not under orders. And yet, allegations of torture by [7:29] Israeli authorities continue to surface, often linked to the same detention facilities repeatedly described [7:35] in detainee testimony. These testimonies suggest that it's not just one or two prisons. It's a network. [7:41] And the use of torture by Israeli soldiers and other authorities across these institutions [7:45] suggests it is not simply the result of individual misconduct or rogue soldiers. It's systematic. [7:52] I've also used statements by whistleblowers who have been collected in Israel. [7:58] And when you put together, I mean, they totally corroborate what Palestinian former detainees and their [8:04] lawyers say. But again, it cannot be reduced to one man or one person only, because as I documented [8:13] throughout my report, there is an entire nation that was aware that torture was inflicted. There are doctors [8:21] who have seen the signs of torture. There are doctors who have supervised the fact that while detained, [8:29] these people were severely abused and raped. In her report, Albanese describes a system of torture [8:36] and sexual violence that, she says, may amount to genocide. Part of this systemic pattern of abuse [8:43] is the level of immunity Israeli soldiers appear to enjoy. Accountability for abuse in Israeli detention is [8:48] almost non-existent. Around 1,300 complaints of torture were submitted to Israel's justice ministry between 2001 [8:55] and 2020. Only a handful resulted in criminal investigations, and none led to indictments. [9:02] Like in a Siddi Taemin case, a leaked video from July 5th, 2024, appears to show Israeli soldiers [9:08] isolating a Palestinian detainee, shielding him from view, and carrying out a violent sexual assault. [9:15] The suspects were detained and investigated by Israeli authorities before the video surfaced, [9:19] with the footage emerging days later, in early August, amid backlash following the soldiers' [9:24] arrests. Yifat Tolmer Yerushalmi, an Israeli major general at the time, said she leaked the video to [9:30] debunk claims by people on the far right, who said that the abuse as Siddi Taemin was fabricated. [9:36] On March 12, 2026, the Israeli military prosecutor's office dropped the case, [9:40] citing insufficient evidence. The soldiers were hailed as heroes. The only person to suffer [9:46] consequences was Yifat. She resigned after leaking the video. She was arrested on charges including [9:52] fraud, breach of trust, and obstruction of justice, and could face jail time. Cases like these start to [9:58] raise bigger questions about how allegations of abuse against Palestinian detainees are actually [10:03] talked about inside Israel. And they point to something else too, oversight. Because when there are [10:08] almost no prosecutions, it raises the question of whether this is being allowed to continue. [10:14] These findings are based on the testimonies of the survivors who were released from detention. [10:18] There are still more than 9,500 Palestinians in custody. Taken together, these accounts suggest [10:24] this isn't isolated. They point to a pattern across sites over time. The question is no longer [10:31] whether abuse is happening, but what that pattern says about the system behind it.