RAMALLAH, (Palestine Foundation Information Center), Rights sources have relayed a disturbing testimony from Palestinian nurse and prisoner Shahd Mohammed Adi, 23, from Beit Ummar, north of al-Khalil, detailing what she said was an escalation of retaliatory and inhumane abuses against Palestinian women prisoners in the Israeli Damon Prison.
Adi’s testimony described the confiscation of copies of the Quran, violent physical assaults and intimidation with police dogs by the Israeli prison administration.
The testimony began with details from a visit held Thursday with Adi, who has been detained since March 25.
She described the moment women prisoners were brought to the visit, saying one was led blindfolded with a used black plastic garbage bag, while another was covered with an old medical mask that had been reused dozens of times, in what she described as humiliating treatment aimed at degrading Palestinian women prisoners.
Adi said that, at midnight two nights earlier, repression forces raided rooms 6, 7 and 8 while women prisoners were performing night prayers.
She explained that the forces blindfolded them, forced them to the ground in a degrading manner and confiscated Quran copies from the rooms, in an apparent attempt to deprive the prisoners of their most basic religious and spiritual rights.
Adi also recalled the abuse she endured from the first night of her arrest, alongside other detainees, in the Soreef, Jaba and Beit Shemesh camps before she was transferred to Sharon Prison.
There, she said, she was forced to remove her jilbab in extremely cold conditions and was subjected to degrading treatment by female soldiers.
She also spoke of deteriorating living conditions inside Damon Prison, including the denial of sufficient summer clothing, which had contributed to the spread of skin allergies among women prisoners without meaningful medical care.
Adi said several women prisoners, including Shireen, Nidaa and Aya, were being held in arbitrary isolation.
She also described a major assault on women prisoners on May 13 as a “nightmare” that still haunts her and her cellmates.
According to Adi, soldiers stormed the sections with police dogs and sound bombs, pointed weapons directly at the prisoners’ heads and mocked them.
She noted that such practices have become almost routine, with dogs released at women prisoners in the middle of the night to spread fear and panic.
Adi sent messages of love and peace to her family and relatives, saying her morale was high and her health was good despite the harsh conditions.
