Btselem /15 June 2024

I am a journalist and the bureau chief of the Al-Araby Al-Jadeed newspaper in Gaza. I lived with my wife and our five children, Nada, 17, Hamza, 15, ‘Ali, 13, Malak, 10, and Sham, 3, in the al-Karameh neighborhood in the western part of Gaza City.

On the morning of 7 October 2023, I was woken by the sound of bombing and the screams of my daughter Nada, who is disabled due to cerebral palsy. She was knocking on the door of the room in a panic and screaming, “Missiles!” “Missiles!”

I turned on the TV and started following the news. That same evening, the Israeli military fired a missile into the empty plot of land that separates the neighbors’ house from ours, and severely damaged our home. The house’s water pipes were destroyed.

The following evening, I heard the neighbors shouting “Evacuate, evacuate the area! They’re bombing the Istanbul building!” That building is behind my home. Then my phone rang and an Israeli officer was on the line. He said to me: “You are Diaa al-Kahlut, and your ID number is such and such. You need to evacuate the house.” He also told me that we should head to the southern Gaza Strip. I told him, “We don’t have anyone in the south. My parents are in the northern Gaza Strip, in Beit Lahiya, and I want to go to them.” He replied, “Don’t go there.”

Every two days they changed each inmate’s position. We were woken up every day at 4:30 in the morning, with banging, cursing

Still, I called my brother in Beit Lahiya and told him we were coming to them. We left the house at around 9:30 P.M., without taking anything with us. We got into our car and drove. When I arrived, my parents and the entire family were waiting for us, very concerned and frightened because the situation was bad and there were bombings everywhere. That’s how our journey of displacement began. The first stop was my parents’ home. Three days later I went home alone to take money, my wife’s gold jewellery, my son ‘Ali’s bird and some food, and returned to my parents’ home.

We stayed with my parents for about two months. The bombings continued nonstop. We suffered from a shortage of food, water and electricity. I charged my phone at the home of neighbors who had a generator, and since communications were partially cut off, I bought an Israeli SIM card so that I could make calls and continue my work.

On 7 December 2023, at precisely 7:00 in the morning, the Israeli military invaded the area of ​​Beit Lahiya. The soldiers announced to us over loudspeakers, “Women, children and the elderly, to Kamal Adwan Hospital. Men from 16 to 60 to the street – take off your clothes and remain in your underwear.”

I went down to the street, as the soldiers ordered us, and took off my clothes. About 10 minutes later the military gathered all the men in the area, roughly 300 men. They tied our hands behind our backs, and one soldier asked me what my name was and what I did for a living. I replied that I was a journalist and handed him my press card, and he took it and broke it. From there they took us to the market in Beit Lahiya.

There were three military trucks there. They put us on the trucks and drove to a military base in the northern Gaza Strip. They covered our eyes with pieces of cloth and threw us onto the sand. There were bulldozers there digging large pits. I thought they would bury us there.

Then they sorted us and took an eye-print with a phone or some other device, I’m not sure. Then a soldier took me to a group of men who, I gathered from him, would be returned to the Gaza Strip. I was there for roughly an hour and then soldiers took me to be interrogated. The interrogator was an officer from the Shin Bet (ISA). I was handcuffed and blindfolded. The officer asked me if they were bothering me and I said they were, and then he said to me: “Now I’ll help you get rid of them.” Immediately after that, he asked a soldier there to really tighten the handcuffs and blindfold. Then he accused me of being a Hamas commander. I denied that and said I was a journalist. He started saying that people said I was Hamas, and I denied it again and told him I was a journalist.

Then a soldier hit me hard on the back and again I told him that I was a journalist, and the same soldier hit me on the back again and the interrogator said to me: “You’re not a journalist.” After he said to me: “You’re a journalist, and you wrote an article about Sayeret Matkal, a [elite Israeli military] unit that entered Khan Yunis in 2018 and clashed with Hamas.” I said to him: “I don’t remember such an article.” He started reading from his phone and saying, “You’re Hamas.” Then the officer mentioned Azmi Bishara, who is the editor-in-chief of the newspaper I work for, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed. Then they all started beating me.

After that, they threw us in a pile on a military truck. I heard screams and cries of detainees, blows and things breaking. Someone next to me in the truck was groaning in pain. He turned out to be a relative of mine on my father’s side, ‘Alaa al-Kahlut. He told me: “They beat me to death, finished me. They beat me with a gun on my back and face.” I told him: “Hold on. Be patient.” He’s still in detention.

We stopped at a military base, where the soldiers took us off the truck and put us on military buses. One soldier slammed my head against the iron siding and said, “Sit in the bus.” The bus drove for roughly an hour and a half and we arrived at another prison facility. I don’t know where it was or what it was called. It was very cold, and whenever I sneezed, a soldier hit me. After we got off the bus, they took the handcuffs off our hands and gave us kind of pajamas to wear. I saw under the blindfold that they were gray. We were barefoot.

They divided us into groups of five, beating and mocking us. There were two trailers side by side. When I went into the first one, the soldier said: “State your name, ID number and where you’re from to the camera.” In the second trailer there was a doctor who asked if we had any diseases or took any medication. I told him I have cartilage problems and regularly take painkillers.

I was tied up while standing on tiptoes, with my arms stretched up and back. They left me in that position for two hours.

We stood in line to enter a shack that looked like an animal pen, and they hit us while we were standing in line and when they led us inside. It was a space surrounded by a barbed wire fence on all sides, with a tin roof, nearly exposed, and we stayed there for the entire period of detention. I was handcuffed and blindfolded the whole time.

We were given thin mattresses and thin blankets, which were filthy and smelled awful. Once every two days they changed each inmate’s position. We were woken up every day at 4:30 in the morning, with banging, cursing and obscenities and we went to bed at 11:30 P.M., with the lights on. At night, whenever we fell asleep, the soldiers started banging on the fence to wake us up. They only let some of us sleep sometimes, such as the sick and the elderly. Our hands were tied in front of us with metal handcuffs, and our eyes were covered day and night.

If a soldier saw us talking to one other, they would tie us standing and facing a barbed wire fence for over two hours. Throughout my detention, I was punished like that roughly seven times, also for moving or coughing. The punishment lasted about three hours each time.

Life there was hellish. No food and no showers. There was a Palestinian shawish [interpreter] who intermediated between the inmates and the military. Every so often he would ask me: “Are you thirsty?” I’d say “Yes” and then he would take me to the toilet trailer and I’d drink from the tap there. We were constantly being cursed at: “Sons of bitches,” etc...

The days passed slowly. On the ninth day, I was interrogated again. They asked about my work as a journalist, who owned Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, how I worked for the newspaper and more. The interrogator, who was in military clothing, threatened me: “You’ll never see sunlight again,” “You’re terrorists.” He also said that when we were detained we had weapons on us. I denied it and told him we had turned ourselves in when the army notified us.

Roughly 15 days later, I was taken for another interrogation. The interrogator repeatedly said to me “You’re Hamas,” “You’re a Hamas commander in the northern Gaza Strip,” and “We have information that you’re a Hamas supporter.” This time the interrogation included the “shabach” position: I was tied up while standing on tiptoes, with my arms stretched up and back. They left me in that position for two hours.

Despite the torture, the beatings and the “shabach” position, I didn’t receive any medical treatment at all and was only given a painkiller once. There were inmates with cancer, as well as an Alzheimer’s patient that I know

A few days later, I was taken for another interrogation where I was tied up in the “shabach” position again. This time I was held like that for over six hours. I felt my body crashing. I was in considerable pain, also because of my pre-existing cartilage problem. The interrogation was like the one before. The interrogator also threatened that I wouldn’t leave and that they could arrest me for 10 years without seeing sunlight. Then he told me they’d leave me there for 20 years and I said, go on, whatever, it doesn’t matter to me anymore.

That same day it rained, and they took off our clothes and put us in diapers. Everyone who was interrogated that day was put in diapers.

For the first 25 days of detention, they forced us to kneel all the time. One night, they had a barbecue next to us and sang and talked about soccer loudly. They did all that to make it hard for us to sleep.

Throughout the entire detention, I showered only twice. The first time, the water was very cold and the shower only lasted three minutes, and the second time the water was hot but we weren’t given clothes afterwards. Each time, I was given either a shirt or pants and you could die from their stench – they smelled of blood and pus from the wounds of prisoners.

Food was brought to us three times a day. For breakfast, two slices of bread and a spoonful of white cheese or jam, and for lunch and dinner a slice of bread with a spoonful of tuna. The food was stale and smelled bad. They brought us apples three times, once a whole apple, the second time half an apple and the third time a quarter of an apple.

Despite the torture, the beatings and the “shabach” position, I didn’t receive any medical treatment at all and was only given a painkiller once. There were inmates with cancer, as well as an Alzheimer’s patient that I know. I saw wounded people from Gaza whose sole treatment was a paracetamol pill, and another yellow pill that the soldiers said was an antibiotic but it had no effect. People screamed in pain.

Each time we were taken from place to place in the prison, we were beaten with every step we took. You walk and are hit in the process. They lead you to an interrogation and beat you in the process. There were inmates the guards forced to stand in the rain. Once, an inmate who needed the bathroom pounded on the fence so they would rush to take him. After going to the bathroom, they dragged him on the ground and beat him half to death. I heard his screams.

We didn’t even know where we were being held. We were entirely cut off from the world

There wasn’t a shred of humanity in their conduct towards us. In my 33 days in detention, I only received the pain reliever I need for my cartilage problem once. The soldiers always knew where was most painful for us and hit us there. I was always hit in the back.

We didn’t even know where we were being held. We were entirely cut off from the world. An officer from the ISA would come and tell us, “We’ve razed the northern Gaza Strip. We took the women and children to Al-Azhar University, and the men to the prisons.” Or: “Your families are no longer alive,” “After your families went to Kamal Adwan Hospital, we took them to the al-Qassam Mosque in Beit Lahiya and bombed the mosque and its courtyard and everyone who was there.” The ISA people used the ugliest measures possible to psychologically pressure us. Throughout the entire period, not one of us met with a lawyer either.

On 8 January 2024, an officer started calling the names of people who were about to be released. My name was last on the list. I was so happy, I cried. We went to bed at 10:30 P.M.

On 9 January 2024, at 3:00 A.M., they replaced our metal handcuffs with plastic zip ties, tying our hands from behind instead of up front and covering our eyes. They let us go to the bathroom and drink water. They gathered us all and made us stand for an hour near the barbed wire fence. When the buses arrived, they put 40 inmates on each bus, accompanied by soldiers. When we arrived at the Kerem Abu Salem [Kerem Shalom] crossing, they gave us water and said, “Go on, get out of here so we don’t shoot you!” When we got to the Palestinian side of the crossing, we were received by employees of the Red Cross and UNRWA. First they treated the wounded inmates and then they drove us to the displaced persons camps. The Red Cross gave each detainee a small sum of money to buy clothes and other supplies, especially for those who don’t have family in the southern Gaza Strip.

My brother Muhammad, who is also a journalist, was detained for nine days and remained in the southern Gaza Strip. When he learned I was out, he came to pick me up. It took three days after my release to contact my family. It was very difficult, due to very weak internet connectivity. In the northern Gaza Strip, the bombings continued and it was difficult to speak with them as they were in constant fear. I managed to call them on video once.

I spent three months sharing a tent with journalists in Rafah. Those were three really tough and discouraging months. The only toilets were in the mosque nearby, and to access them you had to stand in line for an hour and a half. There was nearly no water and we ate one meal a day, usually from cans, if we were able to get anything. Everything was really expensive and life was extremely challenging.

I was hopeful that I could return to the north and that routine life there would resume, but unfortunately the war went on. I had sores on my legs from the torture, which oozed pus, and I started suffering from irritable bowel syndrome. It was impossible to receive effective treatment in the Gaza Strip and I realized that I had to go abroad for treatment. On 10 March 2024 I was able to leave Gaza and travel to Cairo, and after two days, on 12 March 2024, my wife and children managed to reach southern Gaza with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They stayed in Rafah for one night, at my wife’s sister’s home, and the following day, on 13 March 2024, they also managed to leave for Egypt and joined me.

Meeting my wife and children was very exciting and challenging. We cried and hugged. Instead of expressions of joy, we cried. But thank God, we could finally be together, even if we were outside the Gaza Strip.

We stayed in Egypt for two and a half months, and moved to Qatar in 3 June 2024. We are now in Doha and I am working at Al-Araby Al-Jadeed again.

I’m already in better physical condition, although the kids and I have jaundice. We’re slowly healing. My parents and brothers and sisters are still in Gaza and it’s very hard.

* Testimony given over the phone to B’Tselem field researcher Olfat al-Kurd on 15 June 2024