BETHLEHEM, Palestinian Territories: Muazzaz Abayat’s parents barely recognized their son lying in a hospital bed after being freed from nine months in Israeli detention, with his weight halved from his usual heavyset build, hollowed cheeks and shaggy hair.
“I came back from the dead,” the 37-year-old Palestinian, told AFP at a hospital in Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank.
Abayat, a butcher by trade, was arrested without explanation on October 26, just over two weeks after the unprecedented Hamas attack on southern Israel that sparked the Gaza war.
He was held at a prison in the Negev desert, officially under so-called administrative detention, which meant he could be held without charge or trial for an extended period.
“They arrested me at home, not surrounded by fighters but by my children and pregnant wife,” said Abayat, whose sixth child was born while he was in jail.
Detentions of West Bank Palestinians have soared since the war began on October 7, with regular use of administrative detentions.
According to the Prisoners Club, a Palestinian watchdog, about 9,700 Palestinians are currently in Israeli jails, including hundreds under administrative detention.
The NGO estimates that arrests have doubled since October 7 compared to the same period last year.
Violence has surged in the territory since the start of the Gaza war, with at least 572 Palestinians killed by Israeli troops or settlers, according to the Palestinian authorities.
At least 16 Israelis have also died in Palestinian attacks, according to official Israeli figures.
In a video that went viral on social media when Abayat was freed Tuesday, he is seen limping and leaning on a man to walk, while his right hand seems paralyzed.
“No human being on the face of the earth can imagine how life has been” he said, calling the prison where he was held, “the ‘Guantanamo of the Negev’,” after the US prison in Cuba used to hold detainees after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
“We were unjustly detained, killed and severely beaten with iron clubs and subjected to all kinds of torture,” Abayat added.
Israel’s prison administration told AFP it was “not aware” of Abayat’s claims.
“All prisoners are detained according to the law. All basic rights required are fully applied by professionally trained prison guards,” an Israeli Prison Service (IPS) spokesperson told AFP.
“The prisoner was examined and treated medically by the IPS’ finest doctors throughout his incarceration.” The spokesperson said, Abayat could file a complaint if he wished.
Showing his bruised, bony legs, Abayat recounted beatings with clubs and chains, and said his body still hurt all over.
“They gave us 10 to 12 beans with pieces of cabbage, and we had to survive on that from 7.00 am until dinner time,” he said while explaining his dramatic weight loss.
A “before and after” photo montage of Abayat shared online shows a muscular man with a shaved head and trimmed beard — wildly different from the long dishevelled hair and messy beard of the man in the Bethlehem hospital.
“This is enough to tell what happened to me,” he said of the photos.
His father Khalil Abayat told AFP that his son “was a man who weighed about 100, 110 kilos (220 to 242 pounds) and was muscular.”
When Muazzaz stood on the hospital scale Wednesday, he weighed just 54 kilograms.
“When I saw Muazzaz, he was not the same Muazzaz my son was before his arrest,” said the father, shocked by the confusion his son seemed to suffer from.
“He doesn’t recognize me, he’s disorientated and his health is very low.”
Khalil added, however, that doctors had expressed confidence that Muazzaz’s condition would improve. The former detainee has started eating more.
From his hospital bed, Muazzaz admitted that he had “forgotten things.”
But he said he was not completely done with Israeli detention.
“I’ve left a small prison for the big prison” of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, he said.
Palestinian released from Israeli jail ‘came back from the dead’
https://arab.news/r3d67
Palestinian released from Israeli jail ‘came back from the dead’
- Abayat, a butcher by trade, was arrested without explanation on October 26
- He was held at a prison in the Negev desert
Iran’s government says at least 1,060 people were killed in the war with Israel
- Iranian official warns the death toll may reach 1,100 given how severely some people were wounded
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: Iran’s government has issued a new death toll for its war with Israel, saying at least 1,060 people were killed and warning that the figure could rise.
Saeed Ohadi, the head of Iran’s Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans Affairs, gave the figure in an interview aired by Iranian state television late Monday.
Ohadi warned the death toll may reach 1,100 given how severely some people were wounded.
During the war, Iran downplayed the effects of Israel’s 12-day bombardment of the country, which decimated its air defenses, destroyed military sites and damaged its nuclear facilities. Since a ceasefire took hold, Iran slowly has been acknowledging the breadth of the destruction, though it still has not said how much military materiel it lost.
The Washington-based Human Rights Activists group, which has provided detailed casualty figures from multiple rounds of unrest in Iran, has said 1,190 people were killed, including 436 civilians and 435 security force members. The attacks wounded another 4,475 people, the group said.
Israeli strikes kill 18 in Gaza as explosive devices leave 5 Israeli soldiers dead
- Statement: Two of the soldiers ‘fell during combat in the northern Gaza Strip’
- Latest round of negotiations on war in Gaza began on Sunday in Doha
TEL AVIV: Eighteen Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, health officials said Tuesday, as fighting continued amid efforts to broker a US-backed ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
The Israeli military also reported that five of its soldiers were killed overnight in northern Gaza, in an attack that occurred while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was in Washington.
An Israeli security official said explosive devices were detonated against the soldiers during an operation in the Beit Hanoun area in northern Gaza, which was an early target of the war and an area where Israel has repeatedly fought regrouping militants.
Militants also opened fire on the forces who were evacuating the wounded soldiers, the official said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss the incident with the media.
The military said two soldiers were seriously wounded in the attack, which brings the toll of soldiers killed to 888 since the war against Hamas began in 2023.
The soldiers died roughly two weeks after Israel reported once of its deadliest days in months in Gaza, when seven soldiers were killed when a Palestinian attacker attached a bomb to their armored vehicle.
In a statement, Netanyahu sent his condolences for the deaths, saying the soldiers fell “in a campaign to defeat Hamas and to free all of our hostages.”
Health officials at the Nasser Hospital, where victims of the Israeli strikes were taken, said one of the strikes targeted tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis in southern Gaza, killing four people. A separate strike in Khan
Younis killed four people, including a mother, father, and their two children, officials said.
In central Gaza, Israeli strikes hit a group of people, killing 10 people and injuring 72 others, according to a statement by Awda Hospital in Nuseirat.
The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the strikes, but it blames Hamas for any harm to civilians because the militant group operates out of populated areas.
US President Donald Trump has made clear that, following last month’s 12-day war between Israel and Iran, he would like to see the 21-month Gaza conflict end soon. Netanyahu’s visit to Washington may give new urgency to the ceasefire proposal.
White House officials are urging both sides to quickly seal an agreement that would bring about a 60-day pause in the fighting, send aid flooding into Gaza and free at least some of the remaining 50 hostages held in the territory, 20 of whom are believed to be living.
A sticking point is whether the ceasefire will end the war altogether. Hamas has said it is willing to free all the hostages in exchange for an end to the war and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Netanyahu says the war will end once Hamas surrenders, disarms and goes into exile — something it refuses to do.
The war began when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage. Most have been released in earlier ceasefires. Israel responded with an offensive that has killed over 57,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The ministry, which is under Gaza’s Hamas government, does not differentiate between civilians and combatants. The UN and other international organizations see its figures as the most reliable statistics on war casualties.
Trump hosts Netanyahu in push for Gaza deal
- Netanyahu was more cagey on peace with the Palestinians and ruled out a full Palestinian state, saying that Israel will ‘always’ keep security control over the Gaza Strip
- The US proposal included a 60-day truce, during which Hamas would release 10 living hostages and several bodies in exchange for Palestinians detained by Israel, two Palestinian sources close to the discussions had earlier told AFP
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump hosted Benjamin Netanyahu for dinner at the White House on Monday as he pressed the Israeli prime minister to end the devastating Gaza war.
Netanyahu’s third visit since Trump’s return to power comes at a crucial time, with the US president hoping to capitalize on the momentum from a recent truce between Israel and Iran.
“I don’t think there is a hold up. I think things are going along very well,” Trump told reporters at the start of the dinner when asked what was preventing a peace deal.
Sitting on the opposite side of a long table from the Israeli leader, Trump also voiced confidence that Hamas was willing to end the conflict in Gaza, which is entering its 22nd month.
“They want to meet and they want to have that ceasefire,” Trump told reporters at the White House when asked if clashes involving Israeli soldiers would derail talks.
The meeting in Washington came as Israel and Hamas held a second day of indirect talks in Qatar on an elusive ceasefire.
Netanyahu meanwhile said he had nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize — the US president’s long-held goal — presenting him with a letter he sent to the prize committee.
“He’s forging peace as we speak, in one country, in one region after the other,” Netanyahu said.
But Netanyahu was more cagey on peace with the Palestinians and ruled out a full Palestinian state, saying that Israel will ‘always’ keep security control over the Gaza Strip.
“Now, people will say it’s not a complete state, it’s not a state. We don’t care,” Netanyahu said.
Several dozen protesters gathered near the White House as Trump and Netanyahu met, chanting slogans accusing the Israeli prime minister of “genocide.”
Trump has strongly backed key US ally and fellow conservative Netanyahu, lending US support in Israel’s recent war by bombing Iran’s key nuclear facilities.
But at the same time he has increasingly pushed for an end to what he called the “hell” in Gaza. Trump said on Sunday he believes there is a “good chance” of an agreement this coming week.
“The utmost priority for the president right now in the Middle East is to end the war in Gaza and to return all of the hostages,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said.
Leavitt said Trump wanted Hamas to agree to a US-brokered proposal “right now” after Israel backed the plan for a ceasefire and the release of hostages held in Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
The latest round of negotiations on the war in Gaza began on Sunday in Doha, with representatives seated in different rooms in the same building.
Monday’s talks ended with “no breakthrough,” a Palestinian official familiar with the negotiations told AFP. The Hamas and Israeli delegations were due to resume talks later.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff was due to join the talks in Doha later this week in an effort to get a ceasefire over the line.
The US proposal included a 60-day truce, during which Hamas would release 10 living hostages and several bodies in exchange for Palestinians detained by Israel, two Palestinian sources close to the discussions had earlier told AFP.
The group was also demanding certain conditions for Israel’s withdrawal, guarantees against a resumption of fighting during negotiations, and the return of the UN-led aid distribution system, they said.
In Gaza, the civil defense agency said Israeli forces killed at least 12 people on Monday, including six in a clinic housing people displaced by the war.
Of the 251 hostages taken by Palestinian militants during the October 2023 Hamas attack that triggered the war, 49 are still being held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.
The war has created dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people in the Gaza Strip.
Hamas’s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed at least 57,523 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. The UN considers the figures reliable.
Trump says Hamas ‘want to have that ceasefire’ in Gaza
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump voiced his confidence Monday that Hamas was willing to agree a truce with Israel, as he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to push for an end to the Gaza war.
“They want to meet and they want to have that ceasefire,” Trump told reporters at the White House when asked if clashes involving Israeli soldiers would derail talks.
Libya authorities intercept over 100 migrants off coast
- Libya has been gripped by unrest since the 2011 overthrow and killing of longtime ruler Muammar Qaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising
TRIPOLI: Libyan authorities on Monday said they had intercepted 113 migrants off the country’s coast and recovered three bodies in separate operations over three days.
The bodies of three “illegal migrants of African nationalities” were discovered on a beach in Misrata, some 200 kilometers (125 miles) east of Tripoli, the Ministry of Interior said.
Also on Monday, security forces on a speedboat intercepted 54 migrants off Garabulli, 50 kilometers east of the capital Tripoli, the ministry added.
They were brought back to the capital’s port and handed over to the competent authorities, it said.
The day before, “as part of a plan to intensify maritime patrols during the summer,” 20 migrants “of various nationalities” were rescued off Zawiya, 45 kilometers west of Tripoli, the ministry said Sunday.
On Saturday, 39 migrants were intercepted off the eastern coast of Tripoli, the ministry reported, without providing further details about where they were found or their point of departure.
Libya has been gripped by unrest since the 2011 overthrow and killing of longtime ruler Muammar Qaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising.
It has become a hub for tens of thousands of migrants trying to reach Europe, risking their lives at sea.
Migrants intercepted by Libyan authorities — even in international waters before reaching the Italian coast, some 300 kilometers away — are forcibly returned to Libya and held in detention under harsh conditions frequently condemned by the United Nations.
