RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: The Palestinian Authority’s prisoners affairs minister on Monday accused Israel of waging an abusive “war of revenge” against Palestinian detainees since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.
Accounts of alleged mistreatment including torture, rape and other sexual abuses in Israeli jails have all been denied by Israeli authorities.
“Israel has been waging a war of revenge against prisoners within the walls of prisons and detention centers since the first day of the decision to go to war against Gaza,” said the PA’s Prisoners’ Affairs Authority head Qadura Fares.
Speaking at a press conference in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, he added that Palestinian prisoners were treated as “hostages” and the mistreatment was part of the “pressure.”
The authority’s lawyer Khaled MaHajjna denounced abuses which he said he had been told of when he visited detained Gaza journalists Mohammed Arab and Tariq Abed at the Ofer detention center near Ramallah.
MaHajjna said he was told how guards forced one prisoner to “lay on his stomach naked and then a fire extinguisher tube was inserted into his buttocks and the fire extinguisher was turned on.”
He said he was told how other inmates had “electric prods” used on their bodies.
In parallel to increasing complaints by Palestinians, some Israeli rights groups are fighting for a court order to close Sde Teiman, a desert detention camp just for detainees during Israel’s war with militant group Hamas.
The Israeli military said it “rejects outright allegations concerning systematic abuse of detainees in the ‘Sde Teiman’ detention facility, including allegations of sexually abusing detainees.” It also said that it acts within international law.
The lawyer said prisoners were handcuffed when they ate and that meals consisted of 100 grams (3.5 ounces) of bread or tomatoes with some milk.
MaHajjna quoted Arab as saying that he saw one handcuffed prisoner die after being beaten for demanding medical treatment. He said about 100 detainees had diseases and wounds in desperate need of treatment.
He alleged that some prisoners had their hands bound before dogs were then set upon them.
Five Israeli rights groups have gone to court over conditions at Sde Teiman.
The Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), one of the five, said that the high court on Monday ordered the government to respond within three days to the original petition filed in May.
ACRI, Physicians for Human Rights, HaMoked, the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel and Gisha have demanded the closure of Sde Teiman, saying that “severe violations of detainees’ rights” make imprisonment at the facility “unconstitutional and untenable.”
The government has not commented on the case.
According to the Palestinian Prisoners Club, around 9,600 Palestinians are in Israeli jails, including hundreds under administrative detention which allows the military to keep detainees for long periods without being charged or produced in court.
The war started with Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
The militants also seized 251 hostages, 116 of whom are still in Gaza including 42 the Israeli military says are dead.
Israel’s military retaliation has killed at least 38,664 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to data from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
Israel waging ‘war of revenge’ on Palestinian prisoners: PA minister
https://arab.news/52a9f
Israel waging ‘war of revenge’ on Palestinian prisoners: PA minister
- Accounts of alleged mistreatment including torture, rape and other sexual abuses in Israeli jails have all been denied by Israeli authorities
Iran says 14 Daesh suspects arrested planning attacks
The 14 members of “Daesh-Khorasan have been arrested” in a series of operations, the intelligence ministry said in a statement cited by state news agency IRNA.
Daesh-Khorasan, or Daesh-K, is the jihadist group’s Afghanistan branch. “Khorasan” refers to a historical region that included parts of Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia.
IRNA did not specify the nationalities of those arrested, nor when they were detained, but said they were being questioned in the provinces of Tehran, nearby Alborz, Fars in the south, and southwest in Khuzestan.
“The accused came into the country in the past few days aiming to carry out terrorist operations,” the ministry statement said.
In January Daesh, a Sunni Muslim group, claimed twin blasts that killed more than 90 people at a memorial ceremony in Kerman, southern Iran.
It was the deadliest attack in Shiite Muslim-majority Iran since 1978.
At that time, then-interior minister Ahmad Vahidi said Daesh “was carrying out operations in the country in the service of the Zionist regime,” a reference to Iran’s arch-foe Israel.
Since war began in October between Israel and Hamas Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, tensions have soared between Israel and Iran.
In April, Iranian state media reported the arrest of three suspected Daesh members near Tehran.
Baby paralyzed in Gaza’s first case of type 2 polio for 25 years, WHO says
- The WHO has announced that two rounds of a polio vaccination campaign are set to begin in late August and September 2024
- Gaza’s health ministry first reported the polio case in the unvaccinated 10-month-old baby a week ago
DUBAI: A 10-month-old baby in war-shattered Gaza has been paralyzed by the type 2 polio virus, the first such case in the territory in 25 years, the World Health Organization said on Friday, with UN agencies appealing for urgent vaccinations of every baby.
The type 2 virus (cVDPV2), while not inherently more dangerous than types 1 and 3, has been responsible for most outbreaks in recent years, especially in areas with low vaccination rates.
UN agencies have called for Israel and Gaza’s dominant Palestinian militant group Hamas to agree to a seven-day humanitarian pause in their 10-month-old war to allow vaccination campaigns to proceed in the territory.
“Polio does not distinguish between Palestinian and Israeli children,” the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said on Friday in a post on X.
“Delaying a humanitarian pause will increase the risk of spread among children,” Philippe Lazzarini added.
The baby, who has lost movement in his lower left leg, is currently in stable condition, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a statement.
The WHO has announced that two rounds of a polio vaccination campaign are set to begin in late August and September 2024 across the densely populated Gaza Strip.
With its health services widely damaged or destroyed by fighting, and raw sewage spreading amid a breakdown in sanitation infrastructure, Gaza’s population is particularly vulnerable to outbreaks of disease.
Challenge of vaccinations in war zone
Gaza’s health ministry first reported the polio case in the unvaccinated 10-month-old baby a week ago in the central city of Deir Al-Balah, an often embattled area in the war.
Hamas on Aug. 16 supported a UN request for a seven-day pause in the fighting to vaccinate Gaza children against polio, Hamas political bureau official Izzat Al-Rishq said on Friday.
Israel, which has laid siege to Gaza since last October and whose ground offensive and bombardments have levelled much of the territory, said days later it would facilitate the transfer of polio vaccines into Gaza for around one million children.
The Israeli military’s humanitarian unit (COGAT) said it was coordinating with Palestinians to procure 43,000 vials of vaccine — each with multiple doses — for delivery in Israel in the coming weeks for transfer to Gaza.
The vaccines should be sufficient for two rounds of doses for more than a million children, COGAT added.
As well as allowing the entry of polo specialists into Gaza, the UN has said a successful campaign would require transport for vaccines and refrigeration equipment at every step as well as conditions that would allow the campaign to reach children in every area of the rubble-clogged territory.
Poliomyelitis, a highly infectious virus primarily spread through the fecal-oral route, can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis.
Traces of polio virus were detected last month in sewage in Deir Al-Balah and Khan Younis, two areas in southern and central Gaza that have seen hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced by the fighting seek shelter.
Children under five are particularly at risk.
Bracing for war: Lebanese hospitals ready emergency plans
- Lebanon has been setting in motion public health emergency plans since hostilities began
BEIRUT: In Lebanon’s biggest public hospital, nurses are busy honing their life-saving skills as the spectre of all-out war looms, 10 months into intensifying clashes between Hezbollah and Israel over the Gaza war.
“We are in a state of readying for war,” nurse Basima Khashfi said as she gave emergency training to young nurses and other staff at the hospital in Beirut.
“We are currently training employees — not just nurses, but also administrative and security staff.
“With our current capabilities, we’re almost prepared” in case of a wider war, she told AFP.
Lebanon has been setting in motion public health emergency plans since hostilities began, relying mostly on donor funds after five years of gruelling economic crisis.
The threat of full-blown war grew after Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement vowed to avenge the killings last month, blamed on Israel, of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and top Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in south Beirut.
“We’re training to handle mass casualty incidents and to prepare for disasters or war,” said Lamis Dayekh, a 37-year-old nurse undergoing training. “If war breaks out, we’ll give everything we have.”
Growing tensions
The cross-border violence has killed nearly 600 people in Lebanon, mostly Hezbollah fighters but including at least 131 civilians, according to an AFP tally.
On the Israeli side, including in the annexed Golan Heights, 23 soldiers and 26 civilians have been killed, army figures show.
In a building next to the hospital, where the emergency operations center is located, health ministry officials are busy typing away, making calls and monitoring news of the war in Gaza and south Lebanon on large television screens.
“This is not our first war and we have been ready every time,” said Wahida Ghalayini, who heads the center, active since hostilties began in October.
She cited a massive 2020 Beirut port explosion, Hezbollah and Israel’s 2006 conflict and Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war.
The health ministry’s plan includes a helpline for those already displaced by war, an assessment of hospital needs, disaster training for staff and a mental health module.
The emergency room coordinates with rescue teams and hospitals in Lebanon’s south.
The plan prioritizes hospitals based on their location. The “red zone,” at high risk of Israeli strikes, comprises Hezbollah’s strongholds in the country’s south, east and Beirut’s southern suburbs.
But despite Lebanon’s long history of civil unrest and disasters, the public health sector now faces an economic crisis that has drained state coffers, forcing it to rely on aid.
Calls for aid
“We need lots of medical supplies, fuel, oxygen... the Lebanese state has a financial and economic problem,” said Ghalayini.
The state electricity provider barely produces power, so residents rely on expensive private generators and solar panels.
Most medical facilities depend on solar power during the day, she said, pointing to panels atop the adjacent hospital’s roof and parking lot.
Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said the country had enough drugs and medical supplies to last at least four months in case of a wider war.
“Efforts to increase readiness follow the (Israeli) enemy entity’s threat of expanding its aggression,” Abiad said in a statement.
Last month’s strike that killed a top Hezbollah commander targeted a densely packed residential area, killing five civilians and wounding scores more.
It tested the readiness of Beirut hospitals in the high-risk Hezbollah stronghold, Ghalayini told AFP.
As Israel threatens full-scale war, Lebanon is also looking to health workers in Gaza for emergency planning strategies, she said.
“We are observing the Gaza emergency center... to learn from them,” she said, pointing at television footage of bloodied patients at a hospital in Gaza, where the death toll has sparked mounting concerns.
For 25-year-old nurse Mohamed Hakla, the prospect of war is frightening but “our job is to help others. I will not deprive people of this (help) because of fear.”
Turkish drone strike kills three PKK members in northern Iraq
BAGHDAD: A Turkish drone strike on Friday killed three members of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on northern Iraq, Iraqi Kurdistan’s counter-terrorism service said.
The statement said a vehicle which belonged to the PKK was hit by the drone strike near the northern city of Sulaimaniya. A senior PKK member, his driver and a guard were killed in the attack, the statement added.
Turkiye regularly carries out air strikes on PKK militants in northern Iraq and has dozens of outposts in Iraqi territory. The PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984.
Libya armed mobilization causes concern, UN says
- Major fighting paused with a ceasefire in 2020 but efforts to end the political crisis have failed
TRIPOLI: The United Nations Libya mission said late on Thursday it was concerned about reports of forces mobilizing in Tripoli and threats of force to resolve a crisis over control of the central bank.
The mission’s deputy head, Stephanie Koury, told the UN Security Council on Monday that the political and military situations in Libya had deteriorated rapidly over the previous two months, including a series of mobilizations by armed factions.
“The display of military power and armed confrontations in densely populated neighborhoods is unacceptable and threatens the lives and security of civilians,” the mission said in its Thursday statement.
The latest round of tensions emerged after efforts by political factions to oust the Central Bank of Libya (CBL) head Sadiq Al-Kabir, with rival armed factions mobilizing on each side. Libya, a major oil producer on the Mediterranean, has had little stability since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising. The country split in 2014 between warring eastern and western factions, eventually drawing in Russian and Turkish backing.
Major fighting paused with a ceasefire in 2020 but efforts to end the political crisis have failed, leaving major factions in place, occasionally joining in armed clashes, and competing for control over Libya’s substantial economic resources.
The country’s political leaders are drawn from bodies elected a decade or more ago, or installed during periodic international peacemaking efforts to oversee repeated failed transitions. Diplomacy aimed at national elections to replace all Libya’s political bodies has stalled.
Eastern Libya, where the parliament sits, is controlled by commander Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA).
Tripoli and the northwest, where the internationally recognized Government of National Unity (GNU) and most major state institutions are based, is home to rival armed factions that have repeatedly fought. In late July and early August rival groups in northwest Libya mobilized against each other, while the LNA moved a force into southwest Libya, prompting fears of east-west fighting.
Meanwhile there is stalemate in the High State Council, one of the internationally recognized legislative bodies, after a contested vote over its leadership. The eastern-based House of Representatives parliament has also renewed calls to unseat the GNU and Presidency Council.
Tensions over control of the central bank were increased after Presidency Council head Mohammed Al-Menfi issued a decision to replace Kabir and the board, a move rejected by the parliament.
