A System of Cruelty: How Israel’s Prison Policy Reflects a Broader Pattern of Violence 

A System of Cruelty: How Israel’s Prison Policy Reflects a Broader Pattern of Violence 

A recent United Nations investigation has laid bare what human rights advocates have long documented: Israel maintains a systematic and state-sanctioned policy of torturing Palestinian detainees. The UN Committee Against Torture, after reviewing harrowing testimony, concluded that Israel is operating a “de facto state policy of organized and widespread torture” against Palestinians in its detention facilities . This is not a matter of isolated abuses but a coordinated apparatus of cruelty that has intensified since the war in Gaza began, revealing a fundamental component of Israel’s occupation and its broader conduct in the conflict . 

The Grim Reality Inside Israeli Detention Facilities 

The UN committee’s findings, based on evidence from both Israeli and Palestinian human rights groups, depict a landscape of intentional suffering designed to degrade, punish, and break individuals . 

Methods of Torture and Abuse: Palestinian prisoners are subjected to a horrific catalogue of abuses. These include: 

• Severe physical violence: Regular severe beatings, electrocution, and waterboarding . 

• Psychological terror and humiliation: Attacks by dogs, forced nudity, and sexual violence . 

• Deliberate deprivation: Being systematically denied adequate food and water, access to toilets, and medical care. Some are permanently shackled or forced to wear diapers . 

A Deadly System: This regime has lethal consequences. A separate report by Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (PHRI) details the deaths of at least 94 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli custody from torture, assault, deliberate medical neglect, or malnutrition . The stories are gruesome. The body of 33-year-old Abd al-Rahman Mar’i was returned to his family covered in bruises, contusions, and fractures . Seventeen-year-old Walid Khaled Abdullah Ahmad, an athlete before his arrest, died from “severe and prolonged malnutrition,” his body devoid of muscle and fat . Diabetic detainees like 25-year-old Arafat Hamdan have had life-saving insulin withheld, leading to their deaths within days . 

The Legal Architecture of Abuse 

This systematic mistreatment is facilitated by specific Israeli laws and policies that strip Palestinians of basic protections. 

• Unlawful Combatants Law & Administrative Detention: Israel uses these laws to detain thousands of Palestinians, including children, pregnant women, and the elderly, without charge or trial and without access to lawyers or family for prolonged periods . The UN committee states this amounts to “enforced disappearance” . Since October 2023, over 18,500 Palestinians have been arrested, with an unknown number “disappeared” under this framework . 

• The “Necessity” Defense & Lack of Criminalization: The UN committee expressed serious concern that Israel has no distinct law criminalizing torture and that its legislation allows officials to evade culpability using a “necessity” defense during interrogations . This creates a legal loophole for abuse. 

• Blocking Oversight: Israel has systematically blocked independent international oversight. In late 2024, the Israeli Defense Minister renewed a ban on inspections by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), ensuring opacity and impunity . 

Not an Isolated Issue: Torture as Part of a Broader Pattern 

The torture regime in prisons is not a standalone atrocity but mirrors the widespread violations of international law characterizing Israel’s actions in Gaza and the West Bank. Multiple UN bodies and international investigations have drawn clear parallels. 

• The Gaza Genocide: The UN Committee Against Torture pointed out that such treatment, according to the UN’s own Commission of Inquiry, constitutes war crimes, crimes against humanity, and forms part of the actus reus (guilty act) of genocide . This aligns with the assessment of a UN Special Committee report, which explicitly highlights the “ongoing genocide of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip” . The war has killed tens of thousands, with the Gaza Ministry of Health reporting over 44,000 deaths by late 2024, most being women and children . The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has found the claim of genocide “plausible” . 

• Crimes Against Humanity in Gaza: Beyond killings, Israel’s conduct includes the forced displacement of nearly all of Gaza’s population, the destruction of over 63% of all buildings, and the weaponization of humanitarian aid, creating famine conditions . The UN Human Rights Council has heard that Israel’s destruction of schools, hospitals, and cultural sites without military necessity constitutes war crimes and crimes against humanity . 

• Apartheid and Persecution in the West Bank: In 2024, the ICJ issued an advisory opinion finding Israel in breach of the prohibition on racial discrimination and apartheid . In the West Bank, Israeli forces and settlers have killed hundreds of Palestinians, displacing thousands through violence and home demolitions . A two-tier legal system applies Israeli civil law to settlers but military law to Palestinians, denying them basic due process . 

The Shield of Impunity: Domestic and International Politics 

This systemic violence persists due to a powerful culture of impunity, underscored by recent political developments in Israel. 

Netanyahu’s Pardon Request and the Erosion of Rule of Law: As the UN released its torture findings, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made an unprecedented request to President Isaac Herzog for a pre-conviction pardon in his long-running corruption trial, without admitting guilt or expressing remorse . This move, encouraged publicly by U.S. President Donald Trump, has sparked protests in Tel Aviv with signs reading “Pardon = Banana Republic” . Legal experts warn granting it would place Netanyahu above the law, seriously undermining the principle of equality . This domestic assault on accountability mirrors the international impunity Israel enjoys; Netanyahu is already subject to an ICC arrest warrant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza . 

International Complicity and Resistance: Despite the overwhelming evidence, Israel continues to receive substantial military and political support, particularly from the United States, which approved over $17.9 billion in security assistance in 2024 . However, pressure is building. The ICC has issued warrants , the ICJ has ordered provisional measures , and countries like the Netherlands, Canada, and the UK have suspended some arms transfers . Significantly, hundreds of staff at the UN’s own human rights office (OHCHR) have internally urged their leadership to formally declare Israel’s actions in Gaza a genocide and call for a suspension of arms sales . 

Conclusion: A Coherent System of Violence 

The torture of Palestinian prisoners is not a regrettable sidebar to the Israel-Palestine conflict. It is a core element of a coherent system that includes alleged genocide in Gaza, crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution in the West Bank, and the erosion of democratic accountability at home. This system is sustained by discriminatory laws, a rejection of international oversight, and geopolitical protection. 

The UN torture committee’s report is a stark document that moves beyond cataloguing horrors to naming their source: state policy. As one of the authors of the PHRI report stated, the abuse is “not just [a minister’s] policy, it’s an Israeli policy directed against Palestinians” . Until this policy and the overarching structures of occupation and oppression are dismantled, the cycle of violence and the suffering it inflicts upon the Palestinian people will continue. The international community’s failure to enact meaningful consequences not only enables this suffering but implicates it in the violation of the most fundamental norms designed to protect human dignity.