The United Nations has confirmed that at least seventy-five Palestinian prisoners have died in Israeli prisons since the beginning of the genocide in Gaza in October 2023. Most of the victims were from Gaza, while others came from the West Bank and the territories occupied since 1948. The UN declared that Israel bears direct responsibility for their deaths, citing systematic torture, ill-treatment, and deliberately harsh detention conditions.

The UN highlighted disturbing evidence of widespread abuse, including repeated beatings, simulated drowning, sexual assaults, starvation, denial of medical care, and unsanitary conditions. Such practices, the office warned, constitute war crimes and could amount to crimes against humanity. Israel’s refusal to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross access to its prisons was described as part of a culture of impunity, where prisoners are denied even the most basic protections guaranteed under international law.

The UN has demanded an immediate end to these violations and compliance with legal obligations to protect the lives and dignity of Palestinian prisoners. It stressed that Israel must enforce the Israeli Supreme Court’s own ruling to improve food provisions and ensure humane treatment. For families of the detained, however, these assurances offer little comfort, as reports continue to emerge of a prison system turned into another weapon of war against a defenceless people.