“They Called It the Men’s Crusher”: A Palestinian Former Prisoner Recounts a Year Inside Israel’s Detention System

JerusalemIn prison he lost 20 kilos. He was beaten, deprived of sleep, and given barely enough food to survive. “They banged on the doors, shone lights in our faces, forced us to stand for hours. You forgot whether it was day or night. It was a place designed to break both body and spirit.” Abdullah Saleh, a 27-year-old technical engineer, is one of 1,968 Palestinians released on Monday in exchange for the freedom of 20 Israeli hostages, under the ceasefire deal brokered by the United States.

ARA tried to interview several Palestinians freed in the West Bank, but none agreed to speak: the Israeli army has warned that those who talk to the press could face reprisals against themselves or their families. Saleh, who was released in Gaza, was the only one willing to give his testimony by phone. This is his story.

“They Separated Men from Women and Children”

Saleh was arrested on 22 October 2024, when Israeli forces stormed Kamal Adwan Hospital, where he had taken refuge with his family in northern Gaza. “They separated the men from the women and the children,” he recalls. “Then they arrested me, my brothers and a friend.” One of his brothers, Ahmad, was also released on Monday. The eldest, Fawzi, and his nephews Muhamad and Ibrahim remain in prison.

For the first three months Saleh was held at Sde Teiman, a military base near Beersheba that Israel uses as a temporary detention facility for prisoners from Gaza. Human-rights organisations including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the Israeli HaMoked have accused the facility of keeping detainees incommunicado and subjecting them to systematic abuse. Israel maintains that all detentions are legal and necessary for security reasons.

"They had a schedule of abuse"

“They had a schedule — one day psychological abuse, the next physical,” says Saleh. “It wasn’t random; it was planned, calculated.” He says prisoners were forced to strip, beaten, deprived of sleep and humiliated. “They searched our bodies in degrading ways, insulted us, mocked our religion, treated us like animals,” he recalls. “They made us sit for hours on the floor, hands behind our backs, heads bowed. If anyone moved, they beat him harder. They called it the place to crush men.”

Inside the cell, he says, 40 to 60 men were packed into a space barely 16 square metres. “No mattresses, no blankets, no sunlight, no fresh air. Like a tin of sardines.”

Reports published last year in the Israeli daily Haaretz quoted medical staff from the base describing detainees being kept in metal cages, blindfolded and shackled — accounts that match Saleh’s description. The UN Committee Against Torture has repeatedly urged Israel to allow international observers access to the site.

Losing 20 Kilos

Food at Sde Teiman was extremely scarce. “Breakfast was a little milk, lunch a bit of tuna, dinner a small piece of cucumber or tomato with six very thin slices of toast,” he says. During his captivity he lost more than 20 kilos. Israeli NGO B’Tselem and the Palestinian prisoners’ association Addameer, among others, have documented similar testimonies from former detainees.

Medical neglect, he adds, was another form of abuse. “Men with diabetes, high blood pressure or infectious diseases like smallpox asked for medicine and were told to drink water and stay strong. Doctors came maybe once a month or two — only for those on the verge of death.”

HaMoked this year petitioned Israel’s Supreme Court, alleging that detainees at Sde Teiman were denied essential medication and treated only when their condition was critical.

“They Told Us Our Wives and Children Were Dead”

Saleh says the physical mistreatment was compounded by psychological torture. “They tried to make us forget who we were — engineers, doctors, teachers — to make us feel powerless,” he says. “They insulted our families, our faith, our education.”

Guards also used fake news from Gaza as a weapon. “They told us our homes had been bombed, that our wives and children were dead. They wanted to see if we would break.” The UN human-rights office has documented similar tactics — threats against detainees’ relatives that it classifies as psychological torture.

Contact with the outside world was almost impossible. His wife managed to reach him twice through the Palestinian NGO Addameer, which supports prisoners, sending short written messages that took weeks to arrive. “Those letters were the only proof that my daughter Noor was still alive.”

He adds: “We are resilient, but that doesn’t mean we don’t feel pain.”

From Ofer to Naqab

After Sde Teiman, Saleh was transferred to Ofer Prison in the West Bank and later to Naqab Prison — known in Hebrew as Ketziot — located in the Negev desert and one of Israel’s largest detention facilities.

It was “the toughest place”, he says, though he avoids giving too many details. “We had no freedom to move, no dignity, no rest. Only control.” Temperatures were extreme, he recalls, burning in summer and freezing in winter.

Human-rights organisations have long accused that prison of collective punishment, overcrowding and prolonged isolation — allegations Israel denies.

The Return to Gaza

When Saleh was freed on Monday, he tried to call his family. Throughout his detention he had forced himself to memorise his wife’s, brother’s and a friend’s phone numbers. “No one answered. The uncertainty was terrifying.”

Eventually a friend confirmed that his family was alive and waiting for him at the Nasser Medical Complex, where he and other freed prisoners were taken by bus under the supervision of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

“I cried with joy,” he says. “People celebrated our release with sweets and songs. For a moment, it felt like victory.”

The joy, however, faded quickly. “Gaza is rubble,” he laments. “We have no home, no work, no safety. We live in a tent. Sometimes I think prison was better — at least there I didn’t see my daughter crying from hunger.”

Around 9,000 Palestinian prisoners remain in Israeli custody, most of them held without charge or trial under emergency regulations authorised by the Netanyahu government.