July 22, 2024

Deep wounds carved by shackles and restraints on their legs and hands, skin diseases leaving inflamed swellings, and rivers of tears flowing from their swollen eyelids that have not seen light for five months. What has happened and continues to happen at the "Sdei Teiman" detention center is indescribable in words; beating, torment, "ghosting," and verbal and physical insults are all part of the series of torture, in addition to lies told about their families as part of the psychological warfare waged by the Israeli army against Gaza's prisoners.

It should be noted that "Sdei Teiman" is also known as the Yemenite Field Camp, a multi-unit military base under the command of the Southern Command of the occupation army, located about 5 kilometers west of Be'er Sheva. The army, which claims to be "the most moral," only adds to the debunking of this claim, especially in a prison described as the guillotine of Gaza's prisoners.

"I was arrested and found prisoners suspended for more than 10 hours, sometimes for a day or two," recalls Walid Al-Khalili, wishing to erase the memory of his body hanging for three days as he recounts details of his torture at "Sdei Teiman" after being released.

He adds, "They put us all in diapers like those used for children and shoved us into small, dark cells. When they took me out to the prison yard on a rainy day, I was not dressed to protect myself from the winter cold; moreover, they poured ice water on me."

Al-Khalili says, "They placed an electric collar around my head that caused my body to shake, and metal rods that conduct electricity around my feet, while the jailers laughed."

Alongside the starvation warfare that the Israeli jailers deliberately practice against the prisoners at "Sdei Teiman" for periods that could extend to a week, -according to Al-Khalili- he confirms that his peers suffered from hand amputations due to prolonged suspension of their bodies, while others died following bouts of hysterical screaming.

"The investigators questioned us about the location of the Hamas leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. I kept telling the investigators that I had no knowledge of this, and then the cycle of torture would start again," he adds.

Other prisoners who were recently released from that prison, which they describe as dying "from hunger, cold, heat, and torture," report that they were subjected to electric shocks and suffocation in extremely hot conditions, such as being forced to climb into a closed bus with the air conditioning set to unbearable temperatures.

Even within "Israel" itself, human rights institutions have called for the immediate closure of that detention center due to its inhumane conditions, in a prison where, according to those who have been detained, there are no responsible officers to speak with to convey their complaints due to the lack of oversight there.

This was but a small episode of physical torture; psychologically, the staff at that detention center excelled in practicing psychological destruction by showing pictures of the detainees' relatives and claiming that they had killed his family, arrested a prisoner's sister, or displaced another family.

Dozens of prisoners released from "Sdei Teiman" bear remarkably similar scars on their hands and legs, indicative of their exposure to the same method of torture; apart from cases of rape reported by lawyer Khaled Mahajne, who visited the detention center.

Reports state that this notorious detention center houses the bodies of about 1,500 martyrs since the onset of the aggression last fall. Qadura Fares, the head of the Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners Affairs Authority, estimates that the number of Gaza prisoners is not precisely known but could be around three thousand from Gaza throughout the months of aggression.