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A Palestinian prisoner who says he was tortured in a prison in Israel is now telling his story. This is at a time when international and local human rights groups have warned that the abuse in Israeli prisons is systemic. NPR's Hadeel Al-Shalchi spoke to one man. And a warning to listeners - this story contains descriptions of sexual abuse.
HADEEL AL-SHALCHI, BYLINE: Former journalist Sami Saei (ph) was arrested in early 2024 and held in Megiddo Prison in northern Israel. The Israeli military says it detained the 47-year-old for his alleged involvement with Hamas, an allegation he denies. Saei settles in for a Zoom interview with NPR to tell his story.
(Non-English language spoken).
SAMI SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: Saei was placed under administrative detention without charge. That's a legal system which allows Israeli authorities to detain Palestinians without formally charging them or holding a public trial, stating security concerns. Saei says around March 12, 2024, he was blindfolded and abused by four to six Israeli prison guards.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "They were laughing and seemed to be having a good time," he told NPR. Saei says they stripped him from the waist down and severely beat him all over his body. It was so bad, Saei says, he began to fear for his life.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "I just wanted death to come as quickly as possible so I could rest," he says. Suddenly, Saei felt something even worse. He was being sodomized by an object. He says his body instinctively tried to resist.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "But the pain got worse," Saei says, "so I gave in." That's when an image of his family flashed before his eyes.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "My wife, my sons, my daughters," the father of six says. "I wondered, what's my future going to look like after this?" The sexual abuse and beatings continued for at least 20 minutes, he says, but it felt like a lifetime.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "I screamed so loudly, I'm sure people outside the prison heard me," he says. Saei says he was released last summer with no charges brought against him. The Israel prison system declined to comment on why he was released. It denied the allegations of abuse and said that, quote, "all inmates are held according to legal procedures."
Allegations of sexual abuse in Israeli prisons is not new. In 2024, an Israeli TV news channel aired a leaked video showing what appeared to be Israeli guards sexually assaulting a male Palestinian prisoner held in the Sde Teiman army base. Five soldiers were charged with abuse. Naji Abbas is the director of the Prisoners and Detainees Department with Physicians for Human Rights in Israel. He says there's been an uptick in abuse in Israeli prisons and that the far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir is to blame. The minister has ordered such things as restricting water and shower times and reducing visitors for prisoners from their families and lawyers.
NAJI ABBAS: When we are speaking about Palestinians, limiting their freedom is not enough that the condition of the detention should be used as an addition punishment.
AL-SHALCHI: Ben-Gvir has boasted about the worsening conditions for Palestinian inmates in Israeli prisons.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
ITAMAR BEN-GVIR: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "Prisons have become a nightmare for terrorists, and I am proud of that," Ben-Gvir told the Israeli parliamentary security committee last October. The minister's office did not respond to NPR's request for comment. Last December, the Israeli Public Defenders Office published a report concluding that conditions for security prisoners in Israel have deteriorated since the war in Gaza began in 2023. It said many prisoners were suffering from severe hunger and that overcrowding has become worse. The report said that inmates reported frequent unnecessary force and beatings. There was no mention of sexual abuse in the report.
In response to the report, the Israel Prison Service said that since October 7, 2023, it has absorbed thousands of security detainees from Gaza and the West Bank, and that has, quote, "exacerbated the national incarceration crisis." It said it was working on new construction projects to add hundreds of new incarceration spaces. Naji Abbas from Physicians for Human Rights says Ben-Gvir has gotten away with it.
ABBAS: He managed to apply all his ideology, all the policies that he thought about, without even changing the law.
AL-SHALCHI: Last November, a report published by the U.N. Committee Against Torture alleged that there is a, quote, "de facto state policy of organized and widespread torture and ill-treatment" of Palestinians in Israeli prisons. Israel's ambassador to the U.N. called the report, quote, "disinformation." Abbas says before the war, groups like his were able to use the law to help some cases. He says, now, impunity rules.
ABBAS: How the guards see themselves - they see that they are allowed to do whatever they want. If someone get beaten till death and no one get arrested, well, they are getting the message that you can do whatever you want.
AL-SHALCHI: Sami Saei says he hasn't taken his case to court or appealed it. He's not optimistic it'll go anywhere. He says it's been difficult to tell his story.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "The details of what happened to me come flooding back," he says, but he says he owes it to those who are still in prison.
SAEI: (Non-English language spoken).
AL-SHALCHI: "The media needs to keep writing about their suffering," he says, "about the abuse they keep facing today." Hadeel Al-Shalchi, NPR News, Tel Aviv. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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