Gaza Herald_ The Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club announced the death of three detainees from the Gaza Strip inside Israeli prisons, as Hamas urged the United Nations to compel Israel to immediately reveal the fate of all prisoners who have been forcibly disappeared. In a joint statement, the two institutions confirmed the deaths of Tayseer Saeed al-Abed Sabbaba, sixty years old, Khamis Shukri Mar’i Ashour, forty-four years old, and Khalil Ahmed Khalil Haniyeh, thirty-five years old. The family of Sabbaba was formally notified through the Israeli organization HaMoked following a response from the Israeli army. At the same time, additional notices from the occupation confirmed the deaths of Ashour and Haniyeh.
According to the available information, Sabbaba died on December 2, twenty-four, two months after his arrest. Ashour died on eight February two thousand twenty-four, just one day after being detained, while Haniyeh died on twenty-five December two thousand twenty-four after nearly a year of imprisonment. All three men leave behind families; Sabbaba was the father of nine children, while Ashour and Haniyeh each leave behind four.
The two institutions emphasized that these prisoners are part of dozens who have been killed inside Israeli jails since the beginning of Israel’s ongoing genocidal war. They noted that the deaths resulted from torture, starvation, medical neglect, sexual assault, and severe mistreatment that included deliberate deprivation and humiliation. Documentation by prisoners’ rights organizations shows that more than one hundred detainees have been killed in Israeli custody since the start of the war, with eighty-four identities officially confirmed. Fifty of those killed were detainees from Gaza. The total number of Palestinian prisoners killed in Israeli custody since nineteen sixty-seven now stands at three hundred twenty-one, all of whom have known identities.
The Commission and the Prisoners’ Club held Israel fully responsible for the deaths and called on the international human rights system to act urgently to hold Israeli political and military leaders accountable for war crimes. They stressed the need to end the culture of impunity that Israel has enjoyed for decades with the support of the United States and other governments, a level of protection that has reached its peak during the current genocide.
For its part, Hamas mourned the three prisoners and renewed its call for immediate action to compel Israel to reveal the fate of all forcibly disappeared detainees, return the bodies of prisoners who were killed in custody, and ensure accountability for the perpetrators of these crimes. The movement stated that the situation inside Israeli prisons reveals the brutality of the Prison Service’s policies, which include systematic torture, deliberate medical neglect, starvation, physical assault, and violations against detainees. It added that prisoners are held under harsh and degrading conditions that strip them of their humanity and dignity.
Hamas warned that prisoners are being subjected to organized torture, intentional starvation, lethal medical negligence, and physical and sexual violence, in addition to ongoing policies of humiliation and intimidation. The movement urged the United Nations and international human rights organizations to assume their responsibilities and open an international investigation into Israel’s crimes against detainees, including field executions and torture that have caused the deaths of dozens inside interrogation centers and prisons.
The Movement also called for immediate pressure on Israel to halt the abuses taking place in its prisons, asserting that these practices violate every norm and international law.
