As Israel continues its genocide in the Gaza Strip, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor has documented the Israeli army’s sadistic abuse and torture of Palestinians there.
It includes purposefully causing severe physical and psychological harm, which will undoubtedly have long-term effects.
In a new statement following the Israeli detention, investigation and interrogation of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, the Euro-Med Monitor team confirmed that it had received horrifying testimonies and had personally interviewed recently-released victims of cruel torture practices that appeared to have a sadistic bent.
These attacks have left deep wounds and numerous scars on the survivors’ bodies and have negatively affected their psychological health, stated the rights group. It appears from the documented testimonies that the attacks were carried out in retaliation and as collective punishment for being Palestinian.
Ramadan Shamlakh, a 21-year-old who lives in Gaza’s Al Zaytoun neighbourhood, told the Euro-Med Monitor team that the Israeli army arbitrarily detained him and used him as a human shield, in violation of international law. The soldiers then took turns and tortured him with cruel methods, leaving him with extensive scarring on his face and body, some of which will never heal, including the amputation of an ear.
Shamlakh said that he was with his brother Ahmed, who was injured back in 2014, and their three sisters when an Israeli army force raided their home. The soldiers immediately began to beat him and his brother badly, concentrating on Ahmed’s abdominal wound until they eventually reopened it.
According to Shamlakh, the soldiers took his siblings to an unknown location, while holding him captive before torturing him. They brought him to a tank and used him as a human shield before storming a building’s upper floors.
Once the flats were secured, they beat him severely, threw stones at him, made him lie on his stomach, and threw stones at his legs. Meanwhile, one of the soldiers used a knife to cut his fingers and nails, then inserted the blade into Shamlakh’s ear and removed part of it. Finally, they struck him with a chair that was in the room, as well as directly in the head with an ‘iron frying pan’.
‘A M’, who wished to remain anonymous due to safety concerns, informed Euro-Med Monitor’s team of his own experience. Like Shamlakh, A M was arrested by Israeli soldiers in his home in Al Zaytoun and severely beaten during his arrest.
The soldiers yelled, “You did what you did to us on October 7, and today you are in our hands; we will eliminate you,” A M told the team. Using a knife, he said, one of the soldiers started making cuts on A M’s face, hands and back, repeating the words, “We will eliminate you.”
Euro-Med Monitor confirmed that it has received numerous testimonies from Palestinians who were subjected to torture and inhumane treatment when the Israeli army stormed their homes, displacement centres, and neighbourhoods. These testimonies included stories of severe beatings, abuse and humiliation, as well as harm to the victims’ personal dignity.
Additionally, Euro-Med Monitor team members noted that they had observed Israeli soldiers intentionally leaving marks and traces on victims’ bodies that do not easily disappear, as well as engaging in a sadistic level of torture.
All of these actions, according to the human rights group, show that Israeli soldiers are actively targeting the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and causing them great physical and psychological suffering in the name of their national group – further evidence of the crime of genocide.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor renewed its call for Alice Jill Edwards, the Special Rapporteur of the United Nations on the subject of torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment, to look into the serious crimes and grave rights violations that Palestinian detainees have suffered, and to submit reports on the same, in order to help international courts and investigation committees with their work in examining and trying cases of crimes committed by Israel’s army against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.