RAMALLAH, (Palestine Foundation Information Center) The Israeli prison administration continues to impose what rights advocates describe as systematic, abusive conditions on Palestinian prisoners, leading to widespread illness and life-threatening neglect.
According to the Palestinian Prisoner Society (PPS), the vast majority of detainees interviewed in recent visits suffer from health problems, many of them chronic or severe.
In a briefing issued Tuesday, the PPS summarized findings from legal team visits to Israeli prisons between late July and early August 2025. Prisoners reported a rapid spread of diseases, most notably scabies, that has infected thousands and continues to spread, creating a deepening health catastrophe.
The PPS accused the prison administration of deliberately engineering conditions that strip detainees of their dignity, erode their mental resilience, and inflict long-term illnesses that are difficult to treat. It said these conditions are designed to physically and psychologically exhaust prisoners, sometimes leading to death.
The rights group classified the violations in three categories: torture, starvation, and denial of medical care, practices it says have resulted in the martyrdom of 76 prisoners since the start of the Gaza genocide, marking the bloodiest period in the history of the Palestinian prisoner movement.
While all prisoners face such abuses, the intensity varies by facility. In Gilboa prison, detainees have recently endured escalating repression, including severe beatings, electric shocks, the use of attack dogs, and further cuts to already minimal food rations. “Repression is frequent, occurring about once a week,” one prisoner said, describing routine physical assaults, electric shocks, and verbal abuse.
Ofer prison, once among the least affected, has been hit by an unprecedented scabies outbreak. Testimonies indicate that infected prisoners are deliberately housed with healthy inmates, accelerating the spread. Prisoners are forced to share the same blankets, dishes, and toilets under unsanitary conditions. Twelve inmates share a single bottle of shampoo, insufficient even for three people, and are allowed only one-minute showers, not every day.
Prisoners are also deprived of sunlight and ventilation, with some sections denied outdoor breaks for over a month under the pretext of preventing disease spread. Cells have been described as “ovens” due to extreme heat, poor air circulation, lack of clothing, and severe overcrowding.
The Negev and Megiddo prisons, both with histories of torture and prisoner deaths, continue to report cases of scabies and other undiagnosed illnesses. Female prisoners in Damon prison face similar conditions.
In the Ramla prison clinic, 22 detainees, including the wounded, kidney patients needing dialysis, and paralyzed inmates requiring constant care, are reportedly held in “tragic” conditions.
As of early August 2025, there are about 10,800 Palestinians in Israeli prisons, excluding detainees from Gaza held in Israeli occupation army-run camps. This is the highest number since the Second Intifada in 2000. Among them are 49 women, 450 children, and 3,613 administrative detainees, the highest proportion compared to convicted prisoners.
Additionally, 2,378 detainees are classified by Israel as “unlawful combatants,” not counting Gaza detainees in military camps.
