The lads sat in rows, handcuffed and blindfolded, unable to see the Israeli troopers who stood watch over them from the opposite aspect of a mesh fence.
They had been barred from speaking extra loudly than a murmur, and forbidden to face or sleep besides when approved.
Just a few knelt in prayer. One was being inspected by a paramedic. One other was briefly allowed to take away his handcuffs to scrub himself. The lots of of different Gazan detainees sat in silence. They had been all lower off from the skin world, prevented for weeks from contacting legal professionals or relations.
This was the scene one afternoon in late Might at a navy hangar inside Sde Teiman, a military base in southern Israel that has turn into synonymous with the detention of Gazan Palestinians. Most Gazans captured for the reason that begin of the battle on Oct. 7 have been delivered to the location for preliminary interrogation, based on the Israeli navy.
The navy, which has not beforehand granted entry to the media, allowed The New York Instances to briefly see a part of the detention facility in addition to to interview its commanders and different officers, on situation of preserving their anonymity.
As soon as an obscure barracks, Sde Teiman is now a makeshift interrogation web site and a serious focus of accusations that the Israeli navy has mistreated detainees, together with individuals later decided to haven’t any ties to Hamas or different armed teams. In interviews, former detainees described beatings and different abuse within the facility.
By late Might, roughly 4,000 Gazan detainees had spent as much as three months in limbo at Sde Teiman, together with a number of dozen individuals captured throughout the Hamas-led terrorist assaults on Israel in October, based on the location commanders who spoke to The Instances.
After interrogation, round 70 % of detainees had been despatched to purpose-built prisons for additional investigation and prosecution, the commanders mentioned. The remaining, at the least 1,200 individuals, had been discovered to be civilians and returned to Gaza, with out cost, apology or compensation.
“My colleagues didn’t know whether or not I used to be useless or alive,” mentioned Muhammad al-Kurdi, 38, an ambulance driver whom the navy has confirmed was held at Sde Teiman late final yr.
“I used to be imprisoned for 32 days,” mentioned Mr. al-Kurdi. He mentioned he had been captured in November after his convoy of ambulances tried to cross by means of an Israeli navy checkpoint south of Gaza Metropolis.
“It felt like 32 years,” he added.
A 3-month investigation by The New York Instances — based mostly on interviews with former detainees and with Israeli navy officers, medical doctors and troopers who served on the web site; the go to to the bottom; and knowledge about launched detainees offered by the navy — discovered these 1,200 Palestinian civilians have been held at Sde Teiman in demeaning circumstances with out the flexibility to plead their instances to a decide for as much as 75 days. Detainees are additionally denied entry to legal professionals for as much as 90 days and their location is withheld from rights teams in addition to from the Worldwide Committee of the Pink Cross, in what some authorized consultants say is a violation of worldwide legislation.
Eight former detainees, all of whom the navy has confirmed had been held on the web site and who spoke on the file, variously mentioned that they had been punched, kicked and overwhelmed with batons, rifle butts and a hand-held metallic detector whereas in custody. One mentioned his ribs had been damaged after he was kneed within the chest and a second detainee mentioned his ribs broke after he was kicked and overwhelmed with a rifle, an assault {that a} third detainee mentioned he had witnessed. Seven mentioned that they had been compelled to put on solely a diaper whereas being interrogated. Three mentioned that they had obtained electrical shocks throughout their interrogations.
Most of those allegations had been echoed in interviews performed by officers from UNRWA, the primary U.N. company for Palestinians, an establishment that Israel says has been infiltrated by Hamas, a cost the company denies. The company performed interviews with lots of of returning detainees who reported widespread abuse at Sde Teiman and different Israeli detention amenities, together with beatings and using an electrical probe.
An Israeli soldier who served on the web site mentioned that fellow troopers had recurrently boasted of beating detainees and noticed indicators that a number of individuals had been subjected to such remedy. Talking on situation of anonymity to keep away from prosecution, he mentioned a detainee had been taken for remedy on the web site’s makeshift subject hospital with a bone that had been damaged throughout his detention, whereas one other was briefly taken out of sight and returned with bleeding round his rib cage. The soldier mentioned that one individual had died at Sde Teiman from trauma accidents to his chest, although it was unclear whether or not his harm was sustained earlier than or after reaching the bottom.
Of the 4,000 detainees housed at Sde Teiman since October, 35 have died both on the web site or after being delivered to close by civilian hospitals, based on officers on the base who spoke to The Instances throughout the Might go to. The officers mentioned a few of them had died due to wounds or sicknesses contracted earlier than their incarceration and denied any of them had died from abuse. Navy prosecutors are investigating the deaths.
In the course of the go to, senior navy medical doctors mentioned that they had by no means noticed any indicators of torture and commanders mentioned they tried to deal with detainees as humanely as attainable. They confirmed that at the least 12 troopers had been dismissed from their roles on the web site, a few of them for extreme use of drive.
In current weeks, the bottom has attracted rising scrutiny from the media, together with a CNN report later cited by the White Home, in addition to from Israel’s Supreme Courtroom, which on Wednesday started to listen to a petition from rights teams to shut the location. In response to the petition, the Israeli authorities mentioned that it was decreasing the variety of detainees at Sde Teiman and bettering circumstances there; the Israeli navy has already arrange a panel to research the remedy of detainees on the web site.
In a prolonged assertion for this text, the Israel Protection Forces denied that “systematic abuse” had taken place at Sde Teiman. Offered with particular person allegations of abuse, the navy mentioned the claims had been “evidently inaccurate or utterly unfounded,” and might need been invented underneath strain from Hamas. It didn’t give additional particulars.
“Any abuse of detainees, whether or not throughout their detention or throughout interrogation, violates the legislation and the directives of the I.D.F. and as such is strictly prohibited,” the navy assertion mentioned. “The I.D.F. takes any acts of this type, that are opposite to its values, with utmost seriousness, and totally examines concrete allegations regarding the abuse of detainees.” The Shin Guess, Israel’s home intelligence company, which conducts a number of the interrogations on the base, mentioned in a quick assertion that each one of its interrogations had been “performed in accordance with the legislation.”
Yoel Donchin, a navy physician serving on the web site, mentioned it was unclear why Israeli troopers had captured lots of the individuals he handled there, a few of whom had been extremely unlikely to have been combatants concerned within the battle. One was paraplegic, one other weighed roughly 300 kilos and a 3rd had breathed since childhood by means of a tube inserted into his neck, he mentioned.
“Why they introduced him — I don’t know,” Dr. Donchin mentioned.
“They take everybody,” he added.
How Detainees Are Captured
Fadi Bakr, a legislation scholar from Gaza Metropolis, mentioned he was captured on Jan. 5 by Israeli troopers close to his household dwelling. Displaced by preventing earlier within the battle, Mr. Bakr, 25, had returned to his neighborhood to seek for flour, solely to get caught in the midst of a firefight and wounded, he mentioned.
The Israelis discovered him bleeding after the preventing stopped, he mentioned. They stripped him bare, confiscated his cellphone and financial savings, beat him repeatedly and accused him of being a militant who had survived the battle, he mentioned.
“Confess now or I’ll shoot you,” Mr. Bakr remembered being informed.
“I’m a civilian,” Mr. Bakr recalled replying, to no avail.
The circumstances of Mr. Bakr’s arrest mirror these of different former detainees interviewed by The Instances.
A number of mentioned that they had been suspected of militant exercise as a result of troopers had encountered them in areas the navy thought had been harboring Hamas fighters, together with hospitals, U.N. faculties or depopulated neighborhoods like Mr. Bakr’s.
Younis al-Hamlawi, 39, a senior nurse, mentioned he was arrested in November after leaving Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza Metropolis throughout an Israeli raid on the location, which Israel thought of a Hamas command heart. Israeli troopers accused him of getting ties to Hamas.
Mr. al-Kurdi, the ambulance driver, mentioned he had been captured whereas he tried to carry sufferers by means of an Israeli checkpoint. Israeli officers say that Hamas fighters routinely use ambulances.
The entire eight former detainees described their seize in related methods: They had been typically blindfolded, handcuffed with zip ties and stripped bare besides for his or her underwear, in order that Israeli troopers might be certain they had been unarmed.
Most mentioned they had been interrogated, punched and kicked whereas nonetheless in Gaza, and a few mentioned they had been overwhelmed with rifle butts. Later, they mentioned, they had been filled with different half-naked detainees into navy vans and pushed to Sde Teiman.
Some mentioned that they had later frolicked within the official Israeli jail system, whereas others mentioned they had been introduced straight again to Gaza.
Throughout his month on the web site, Mr. Bakr spent 4 days, on and off, underneath interrogation, he mentioned.
“I take into account them the worst 4 days of my complete life,” mentioned Mr. Bakr.
How the Website Developed
Throughout earlier wars with Hamas, together with the 50-day battle in 2014, the Sde Teiman navy base intermittently held small numbers of captured Gazans. A command heart and warehouse for navy autos, the bottom was chosen as a result of it’s near Gaza and homes an outpost of the navy police, who oversee navy detention amenities.
In October, Israel began utilizing the location to detain individuals captured in Israel throughout the Hamas-led assault, housing them in an empty tank hangar, based on the location commanders. As soon as Israel invaded Gaza on the finish of that month, Sde Teiman started receiving so many individuals that the navy refitted three different hangars to detain them and transformed a navy police workplace to create extra space for interrogations, they mentioned.
By late Might, they mentioned, the bottom included three detention websites: the hangars the place detainees are guarded by navy police; close by tents, the place detainees are handled by navy medical doctors; and an interrogation facility in a separate a part of the bottom that’s staffed by intelligence officers from Israel’s navy intelligence directorate and the Shin Guess.
Categorized as “illegal combatants” underneath Israeli laws, detainees at Sde Teiman might be held for as much as 75 days with out judicial permission and 90 days with out entry to a lawyer, not to mention a trial.
The Israeli navy says these preparations are permitted by the Geneva Conventions that govern worldwide battle, which permit the internment of civilians for safety causes. The commanders on the web site mentioned that it was important to delay entry to legal professionals so as to forestall Hamas fighters from conveying messages to their leaders in Gaza, hindering Israel’s battle effort.
After an preliminary interrogation at Sde Teiman, detainees nonetheless suspected of getting militant ties are normally transferred to a different navy web site or a civilian jail. Within the civilian system, they’re presupposed to be formally charged; in Might, the federal government mentioned in a submission to Israel’s Supreme Courtroom that it had began prison proceedings in opposition to “lots of” of individuals captured since Oct. 7, with out giving additional particulars concerning the actual variety of instances or their standing. There have been no identified trials of Gazans captured since October.
Specialists on worldwide legislation say Israel’s system round preliminary detention is extra restrictive than many Western counterparts by way of the time it takes for judges to evaluate every case, in addition to within the lack of entry for Pink Cross employees.
Early in its battle in opposition to the Taliban in Afghanistan, the USA additionally delayed unbiased evaluate of a detainee’s case for 75 days, mentioned Lawrence Hill-Cawthorne, a legislation professor who wrote an overview of the legal guidelines governing detention of nonstate combatants. The U.S. shortened that delay in 2009 to 60 days, whereas in Iraq instances had been reviewed inside per week, the professor mentioned.
Israel’s determination to delay judicial evaluate of a case for 75 days with out offering entry to legal professionals or the Pink Cross “appears to be like to me like a type of incommunicado detention, which itself is a violation of worldwide legislation,” Professor Hill-Cawthorne mentioned.
After Mr. Bakr disappeared instantly in January, he mentioned, his household had no method of discovering out the place he was. They assumed he was useless.
The place the Detainees Reside
Inside Sde Teiman, Mr. Bakr was held in an open-sided hangar the place he mentioned he was compelled, with lots of of others, to sit down handcuffed in silence on a mat for as much as 18 hours a day. The hangar had no exterior wall, leaving it open to the rain and the chilly, and guards watched him from the opposite aspect of a mesh fence.
All of the detainees wore blindfolds — apart from one, identified by the Arabic phrase “shawish,” which suggests sergeant. The shawish acted as a go-between the troopers and the prisoners, doling out meals and escorting fellow prisoners to a block of transportable bathrooms within the nook of the hangar.
Weeks later, Mr. Bakr mentioned, he was appointed as a shawish, permitting him to see his environment correctly.
His account broadly matches that of different detainees and is per what The Instances was proven on the web site in late Might.
The commanders on the web site mentioned detainees had been allowed to face up each two hours to stretch, sleep between roughly 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. and pray at any time. For a quick interval in October, they mentioned, detainees had been allowed to take off their blindfolds and transfer round freely inside the hangars. However that association ended after some detainees grew to become unruly or tried to unlock their handcuffs, the commanders mentioned.
Exhausted after the journey to Sde Teiman, Mr. Bakr fell asleep quickly after his arrival — prompting an officer to summon him to a close-by command room, he mentioned.
The officer started beating him, Mr. Bakr mentioned. “That is the punishment for anybody who sleeps,” he recalled the officer saying.
Others described related responses to minor infractions. Rafiq Yassin, 55, a builder detained in December, mentioned he was overwhelmed repeatedly in his stomach after attempting to peek from beneath his blindfold. He mentioned he started vomiting blood and was handled at a civilian hospital within the close by metropolis of Beersheba. Requested concerning the declare, the hospital referred The Instances to the well being ministry, which declined to remark.
The Israeli soldier who witnessed abuses at a hangar mentioned one detainee was overwhelmed so exhausting that his ribs bled after he was accused of peeking beneath his blindfold, whereas one other was overwhelmed after speaking too loudly too typically.
The Instances didn’t witness any beatings throughout the go to to the hangar, the place some detainees had been seen praying whereas others had been assessed by paramedics or introduced by the shawish to scrub in a sink in the back of the hangar. One man could possibly be seen peeking beneath his blindfold with out speedy punishment.
Like the opposite former detainees, Mr. Bakr recalled receiving three meager snacks on most days — sometimes bread served with small portions of both cheese, jam or tuna, and infrequently cucumbers and tomatoes. The navy mentioned that the meals provisions had been “authorized by a certified nutritionist so as to preserve their well being.”
In response to a number of former detainees, it was not sufficient. Three mentioned they misplaced greater than 40 kilos throughout their detention.
Some medical remedy is accessible on web site. The commanders introduced The Instances to an workplace the place they mentioned medics screened each detainee on arrival, along with monitoring them day-after-day within the hangars. Critical instances are handled in a close-by cluster of tents that kind a makeshift subject hospital.
Inside these tents, sufferers are blindfolded and handcuffed to their beds, in accordance with a well being ministry doc outlining insurance policies for the location, which was reviewed by The Instances.
In the course of the go to, 4 medics on the hospital mentioned these measures had been needed to stop assaults on the medical employees. They mentioned that at the least two prisoners had tried to assault medics throughout their remedy.
However others, together with Dr. Donchin, mentioned that in lots of instances {the handcuffs} had been pointless and made it more durable to deal with individuals correctly.
Two Israelis who had been on the hospital final yr mentioned that its employees members had been a lot much less skilled and extra poorly outfitted throughout earlier phases of the battle. One in all them, who spoke on situation of anonymity to keep away from prosecution, mentioned that on the time sufferers weren’t given sufficient painkillers throughout painful procedures.
Physicians for Human Rights, a rights group in Israel, mentioned in a report in April that the sector hospital was “a low level for medical ethics and professionalism.”
The hospital’s present management acknowledged that it had not at all times been as well-equipped because it has turn into, however mentioned its employees was at all times extremely skilled.
Dr. Donchin mentioned in some respects the remedy on the subject clinic was now “a little bit higher” than in Israeli civilian hospitals, primarily as a result of it was staffed by a number of the greatest medical doctors in Israel. Dr. Donchin, a lieutenant colonel within the navy reserve, was a long-serving anesthesiologist at a serious hospital in Jerusalem and now teaches at a number one medical faculty.
The amenities and tools seen by The Instances included an anesthesia machine, an ultrasound monitor, X-ray tools, a tool for analyzing blood samples, a small working theater and a storeroom containing lots of of medicines.
Medical doctors serving at Sde Teiman who spoke to The Instances mentioned they had been additionally informed to not write their names on any official documentation and to not tackle one another by identify in entrance of the sufferers.
Dr. Donchin mentioned that officers feared they could possibly be recognized and charged with battle crimes on the Worldwide Legal Courtroom.
Throughout The Instances’s go to, three medical doctors mentioned they didn’t worry prosecution however sought anonymity to stop Hamas and their allies from attacking them or their households.
How the Interrogations Work
Roughly 4 days after his arrival, Mr. Bakr mentioned he was referred to as in for interrogation.
Like others who spoke to The Instances, he remembered being delivered to a separate enclosure that the detainees referred to as the “disco room” — as a result of, they mentioned, they had been compelled to hearken to extraordinarily loud music that prevented them from sleeping. Mr. Bakr thought of it a type of torture, saying it was so painful that blood started to trickle from inside his ear.
The Israeli navy mentioned that the music was “not excessive and never dangerous,” performed inside earshot of Israelis and Palestinians alike, and was meant to stop the detainees from simply conferring with one another earlier than interrogation. The Instances was not proven any a part of the interrogation advanced, together with the world the place music was performed.
Carrying nothing however a diaper, Mr. Bakr mentioned, he was then delivered to a separate room to be questioned.
The interrogators accused him of Hamas membership and confirmed him images of militants to see if he might establish them. In addition they requested him concerning the whereabouts of hostages, in addition to a senior Hamas chief who lived close to Mr. Bakr’s household dwelling. When Mr. Bakr denied any connection to the group or information of the pictured males, he was overwhelmed repeatedly, he mentioned.
Mr. al-Hamlawi, the senior nurse, mentioned a feminine officer had ordered two troopers to raise him up and press his rectum in opposition to a metallic stick that was mounted to the bottom. Mr. al-Hamlawi mentioned the stick penetrated his rectum for roughly 5 seconds, inflicting it to bleed and leaving him with “insufferable ache.”
A leaked draft of the UNRWA report detailed an interview that gave an analogous account. It cited a 41-year-old detainee who mentioned that interrogators “made me sit on one thing like a scorching metallic stick and it felt like fireplace,” and likewise mentioned that one other detainee “died after they put the electrical stick up” his anus.
Mr. al-Hamlawi recalled being compelled to sit down in a chair wired with electrical energy. He mentioned he was shocked so typically that, after initially urinating uncontrollably, he then stopped urinating for a number of days. Mr. al-Hamlawi mentioned he, too, had been compelled to put on nothing however a diaper, to cease him from soiling the ground.
Ibrahim Shaheen, 38, a truck driver detained in early December for practically three months, mentioned he was shocked roughly half a dozen instances whereas sitting in a chair. Officers accused him of concealing details about the placement of useless hostages, Mr. Shaheen mentioned.
Mr. Bakr additionally mentioned he was compelled to sit down in chair wired with electrical energy, sending a present pulsing by means of his physique that made him cross out.
Launched With out Cost
After greater than a month in detention, Mr. Bakr mentioned, the officers appeared to just accept his innocence.
Early one morning in February, Mr. Bakr was placed on a bus heading to Israel’s border with southern Gaza: After a month of detention, he was about to be launched.
He mentioned he requested for his cellphone and the 7,200 shekels (roughly $2,000) that had been confiscated from him throughout his arrest in Gaza, earlier than he reached Sde Teiman.
In response, a soldier hit and shouted at him, Mr. Bakr mentioned. “Nobody ought to ask about his cellphone or his cash,” the soldier mentioned, based on Mr. Bakr.
The navy mentioned all private belongings had been documented and positioned in sealed luggage after detainees arrived at Sde Teiman, and returned on their launch.
Round daybreak, the bus arrived on the Kerem Shalom crossing level, close to the southern tip of Gaza.
Like different returned detainees, Mr. Bakr walked for roughly a mile earlier than being greeted by assist employees from the Pink Cross. They fed him and briefly checked his medical situation. Then they introduced him to a close-by terminal the place, he mentioned, he was briefly interrogated by Hamas safety officers about his time in Israel.
Borrowing a cellphone, he referred to as his household, who had been nonetheless 20 miles away in Gaza Metropolis.
It was the primary time that that they had heard from him in additional than a month, Mr. Bakr mentioned.
“They requested me, ‘Are you alive?’”
Iyad Abuheweila contributed reporting from Istanbul; Gabby Sobelman from Rehovot, Israel; and Ronen Bergman from Tel Aviv.
