HAARETZ Une entreprise US, des chauffeurs d’Europe de l’Est, des liens avec Israël : qui est derrière l’acheminement de l’aide à Gaza

Arkel International, un sous-traitant du gouvernement usaméricain et d’armées du monde entier, transporte de l’aide vers les sites de la Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). Son représentant en Israël est un homme d’affaires, consul honoraire du Rwanda, qui a précédemment négocié des contrats de défense en Afrique.

Bar Peleg, Yaniv Kubovich et Avi Scharf, Haaretz, 5/8/2025

Traduit par Tlaxcala

Des véhicules blindés escortent des camions d’aide humanitaire vers le passage de Kerem Shalom, à la frontière entre Israël et la bande de Gaza. On peut voir un graffiti représentant le mot « millénaire » en hébreu sur l’avant d’un camion. Photo : Eliahu Hershkovitz

Au cours des derniers mois, un hôtel situé dans un kibboutz du sud d’Israël est devenu le lieu de résidence de chauffeurs routiers étrangers venus de plusieurs pays d’Europe de l’Est.

La plupart d’entre eux sont arrivés en Israël au cours des derniers mois après s’être vu promettre une opportunité financière qui leur permettrait de gagner un salaire beaucoup plus élevé que dans leur pays d’origine. Pour gagner leur vie, les chauffeurs doivent effectuer un trajet quotidien, parfois deux, entre le point de passage frontalier de Kerem Shalom et les points de distribution alimentaire à l’intérieur de la bande de Gaza.

Ces chauffeurs, principalement originaires de Géorgie et de Serbie, pays avec lesquels Israël n’a pas conclu d’accord bilatéral en matière de main-d’œuvre, ont été amenés en Israël par une société usaméricaine impliquée dans le projet d’aide alimentaire dans la bande de Gaza : Arkel International LLC, une entreprise de construction et de logistique qui opère en tant que sous-traitant pour la Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a appris Haaretz.

La GHF, qui gère quatre centres de distribution d’aide dans la bande de Gaza, emploie au moins trois entreprises en tant que sous-traitants.

Jusqu’à présent, deux de ces sociétés étaient connues : la première est UG Solutions, qui a participé plus tôt cette année à la sécurisation du corridor de Netzarim lors d’un échange d’otages et qui s’occupe désormais de certains aspects de la sécurité sur les sites de distribution de l’aide humanitaire. La deuxième est Safe Reach Solutions, une société de logistique et d’opérations.

La troisième société, Arkel International, est responsable de la logistique des opérations de distribution de l’aide humanitaire.

Selon les documents constitutifs de la société en Israël, son représentant autorisé dans le pays est Hezi Bezalel, un homme d’affaires israélien qui a précédemment négocié des contrats de défense en Afrique. La société affirme qu’il n’est pas impliqué dans ses activités et qu’il a seulement aidé à sa création en Israël.

« Je suis chauffeur routier en Géorgie . Mon patron m’a proposé de venir en Israël par l’intermédiaire d’un courtier et m’a dit que je pouvais gagner deux fois plus, voire plus », a déclaré à Haaretz un chauffeur routier de 32 ans, marié et père d’une fille.

Lorsqu’on lui a demandé qui l’avait amené en Israël et qui payait son salaire, il a répondu : « C’est la société Arkel qui nous a amenés ici. C’est elle qui nous paie nos salaires, et c’est avec elle que nous avons signé le contrat. Notre travail consiste à partir le matin dans un convoi de camions et à entrer dans Gaza. L’armée israélienne nous escorte jusqu’à la zone de distribution. Nous arrivons avec les camions, ils les déchargent pour nous sur le site, et nous repartons immédiatement. Il y a parfois deux trajets par jour », a déclaré le chauffeur.

Arkel transporte des colis alimentaires depuis un point de chargement près de Kerem Shalom vers des lieux de livraison à l’intérieur de Gaza : trois dans le sud, près des ruines de Rafah, et un le long de la partie sud du corridor de Netzarim. Dans le cadre de ce projet, Arkel a fait venir en Israël des dizaines de travailleurs étrangers, dont certains chauffeurs routiers d’Europe de l’Est.

Arkel est enregistrée dans l’État de Louisiane, aux USA, depuis 2005. La société s’est enregistrée en Israël en tant que société étrangère le 13 mai 2025, une semaine avant que les centres de distribution de l’aide du GHF ne commencent leurs activités dans la bande de Gaza et un jour avant l’enregistrement de Safe Reach Solutions en Israël. Au moins un des dirigeants d’Arkel vit en Israël depuis octobre 2024.

Hezi Bezalel (né en 1951) est un homme d'affaires, banquier d'investissement et producteur de cinéma très impliqué en Afrique de l'Est (Kenya, Ouganda, Rwanda, Éthiopie) et ami personnel de Paul Kagame

Au moins un mois avant l’enregistrement officiel de la société en Israël, des discussions étaient déjà en cours concernant sa création. Comme l’a précédemment rapporté Haaretz, l’opération d’aide à Gaza a été lancée par des officiers du commandement sud de l’armée israélienne, à l’insu de l’ensemble des autorités de défense, et coordonnée par le bureau du Premier ministre.

Selon une source proche du projet, Arkel devait initialement construire les sites de distribution à l’intérieur de Gaza, mais cette tâche a finalement été confiée à l’armée israélienne.

Dans les documents constitutifs d’Arkel en Israël, c’est Hezi Bezalel, un homme d’affaires qui a fondé un opérateur de téléphonie mobile en Israël, négocié des contrats de défense en Afrique et occupe le poste de consul honoraire du Rwanda en Israël, qui est désigné comme le représentant de la société en Israël.

La société lui a donné procuration pour gérer ses activités en Israël, ouvrir et gérer un compte bancaire pour la société, nommer des avocats et des comptables pour la société et recevoir des documents juridiques au nom de la société.

La société affirme que Bezalel n’a fait que l’aider à se lancer en Israël, grâce à une relation de longue date nouée au fil de projets menés en Afrique depuis des décennies, et qu’il n’est pas un partenaire commercial. Selon une source bien informée, Bezalel aurait même obtenu l’accord du ministère de la Défense avant l’ouverture de la société en Israël.

Un employé d’Arkel a déclaré à Haaretz que les seuls signataires autorisés au sein de la société sont aujourd’hui le PDG et le directeur des opérations ; cependant, le nom de Bezalel n’a pas encore été retiré du dossier de la société auprès de l’Autorité des sociétés israéliennes.

Actuellement, l’activité principale de la société consiste à transporter des marchandises depuis le point de chargement de Kerem Shalom vers des centres de distribution situés dans la bande de Gaza. Les camions utilisés par Arkel appartenaient auparavant à la société de logistique israélienne Millennium.

Des photos obtenues par Haaretz à proximité de Kerem Shalom montrent que le nom de la société a été grossièrement effacé à la peinture. Selon Arkel, les camions leur ont été vendus par Millennium.

Millennium a déclaré que les camions avaient été vendus à un fournisseur, sans toutefois préciser lequel. Les camions entrent dans la bande de Gaza en longs convois, sans plaque d’immatriculation, et sont sécurisés par du personnel d’autres entreprises sous-traitantes.

Comme mentionné, les chauffeurs sont des travailleurs d’Europe de l’Est, notamment de Géorgie et de Serbie, pays avec lesquels Israël n’a pas conclu d’accords bilatéraux pour l’importation de main-d’œuvre.

Des camions d’aide humanitaire d’Arkel sont garés dans le quai de chargement près du kibboutz Kerem Shalom, dans le sud d’Israël, dimanche. Les camions n’ont pas de plaques d’immatriculation et certains portent des graffitis noircissant le nom « Millennium ». Photo : Eliahu Hershkovitz

Les chauffeurs sont logés dans un kibboutz dans le sud d’Israël. « En gros, nous restons au kibboutz toute la journée, sauf lorsque nous livrons des marchandises à Gaza », a déclaré un chauffeur serbe. « Nous voulions vraiment visiter Jérusalem et Nazareth, mais nous ne sommes pas autorisés à trop nous déplacer à l’extérieur et, jusqu’à présent, nous n’avons pas organisé de visite touristique. »

Les chauffeurs indiquent qu’ils gagnent environ 4 000 shekels (1004 €) par mois, soit plus que le salaire moyen dans leur pays d’origine. « Le travail n’est pas vraiment dangereux », explique l’un d’eux. « Nous ne distribuons pas la nourriture. Nous quittons généralement Gaza dès que le chargement est déchargé. Il y a beaucoup d’explosions et de tirs tout le temps, mais cela ne nous vise pas, donc dans l’ensemble, c’est sûr. »

La plupart des chauffeurs interrogés par Haaretz ont déclaré que leur contrat expirait le mois prochain. « À l’heure actuelle, tout le monde ici est censé partir en septembre. On ne sait pas si les contrats seront prolongés ou si d’autres personnes seront recrutées pour nous remplacer. Un responsable a déclaré cette semaine que nous pourrions rentrer [chez nous] encore plus tôt, dans les prochaines semaines, car ces convois vers Gaza pourraient devenir inutiles », a déclaré un chauffeur.

Les marchandises transportées par les camions – certaines achetées en Israël, selon TheMarker – sont emballées dans des entrepôts en Israël, en partie au port d’Ashdod et à Jérusalem, puis chargées dans des camions dans un centre logistique construit près de la frontière avec Gaza.

TheMarker a indiqué que l’une des entreprises responsables était Millennium. Lors d’un entretien avec Haaretz, le propriétaire de Millennium, Shimon Sabah, a déclaré que son entreprise ne fournissait plus aucune aide logistique au client impliqué dans l’aide humanitaire à Gaza et que le fait que le logo n’ait pas été effacé des camions était dû à une négligence de la part de l’entreprise.

Arkel International est une société d’infrastructure et de services créée aux USA il y a environ 60 ans et enregistrée en Louisiane depuis 20 ans. Le seul propriétaire de toutes les actions d’Arkel est George H. Knost III. Le directeur est John Moore.

La société est un sous-traitant du gouvernement usaméricain et d’armées et de gouvernements du monde entier, qui gère des projets de construction, d’énergie et de logistique. Selon le site web aujourd’hui disparu de la société, celle-ci opère « là où d’autres ne peuvent ou ne veulent pas ».

Depuis 2010, la société a remporté plus d’une centaine de contrats d’une valeur de plusieurs centaines de millions de dollars auprès du ministère usaméricain de la Défense et du département d’État pour des projets en Irak, en Afghanistan et ailleurs. C’est la première fois qu’elle entreprend un projet civilo-militaire de cette envergure en Israël.

La société est également impliquée dans le forage pétrolier et gazier et travaille comme sous-traitant pour le gouvernement usaméricain, ainsi que pour des armées et des gouvernements du monde entier, gérant des projets de construction, d’énergie et de logistique.

Des cartons contenant de l’aide humanitaire sont entreposés du côté gazaoui du point de passage de Kerem Shalom avant d’être distribués par la Fondation humanitaire de Gaza, en juillet. Photo : Ohad Zwigenberg/AP

Malgré les critiques internationales à l’encontre du projet d’aide à Gaza, Arkel est fière de ce travail, qu’elle considère comme un soutien à Israël et une aide pour renverser le contrôle du Hamas sur Gaza. Une source au sein de l’entreprise, s’exprimant auprès du journal Haaretz, a déclaré qu’elle estimait que la plupart des critiques à l’encontre du projet étaient « des fausses informations et de la propagande du Hamas visant à discréditer Israël ».

Travis Daharash, chef de projet chez Arkel, a déclaré : « Arkel fournit à la GHF un soutien logistique et en matière de construction. Bien que nous ne fournissions pas d’informations spécifiques sur notre main-d’œuvre pour des raisons de sécurité, celle-ci répond à toutes les exigences locales. »

Le financement du projet d’aide humanitaire est largement opaque et la GHF ne révèle pas l’identité de ses donateurs. En juin de cette année, environ un mois après le début des activités du fonds, le département d’État usaméricain a approuvé un financement de 30 millions de dollars pour l’entreprise. Selon un rapport de Reuters, cette somme sera versée par l’Agence américaine pour le développement international à la GHF, dont sept millions de dollars seront transférés immédiatement.

Jeudi, Reuters a rapporté que des responsables de l’administration Trump avaient déclaré au Congrès en juillet qu’Israël avait accepté de verser une somme équivalente à celle versée par les USA et de transférer 30 millions de dollars au fonds.

En juin dernier, Liel Kyzer a rapporté pour la chaîne publique Kan que le gouvernement avait prévu 700 millions de shekels [175 M€] pour l’aide humanitaire à Gaza et que cette mesure était financée par une réduction massive du budget de l’État, y compris des services sociaux.

Le ministère des Finances et le bureau du Premier ministre ont démenti cette information à l’époque, affirmant qu’Israël ne finance pas l’aide humanitaire à Gaza.

Les centres d’aide de la GHF ont commencé à fonctionner en mai. Ce fonds a été créé par Israël en collaboration avec des sociétés de sécurité privées.

Des travailleurs usaméricains et palestiniens gèrent ces centres, tandis que l’armée israélienne les sécurise à plusieurs centaines de mètres de distance. Chaque jour, des milliers, voire des dizaines de milliers de Gazaouis viennent chercher de la nourriture dans ces centres. Malgré les promesses faites par le fonds au début du projet d’aide, la distribution ne se fait pas de manière ordonnée, mais dans une bousculade générale pour s’emparer des cartons.

Haaretz a fait état d’un chaos généralisé sur les sites de distribution, où des centaines de Palestiniens ont été tués alors qu’ils se rendaient sur place pour recevoir de la nourriture depuis que le GHF a commencé ses opérations d’aide ces derniers mois.

 

HAARETZArmed Gaza Militia Rivaling Hamas Hands Out Aid in Israeli-controlled Zone

Analysis of satellite images and videos shows the Abu Shabab militia operating near Rafah along Gaza's main north-south route. Its armed members man checkpoints and distribute aid amid allegations that Netanyahu's government is arming ISIS-affiliated militias

Nir Hasson Rawan Suleiman Avi Scharf Jonathan Lis
Haaretz, June 5, 2025

Satellite images and videos posted online in recent weeks show that a new armed Palestinian militia has expanded its presence in southern Gaza, operating inside an area under the direct control of the Israel Defense Forces.Last month, Haaretz revealed the activities of a group calling itself the "Anti-Terror Service," operating in eastern Rafah. The group is reportedly led by Yasser Abu Shabab, a Rafah resident from a Bedouin family, known locally for his involvement in criminal activity and the looting of humanitarian aid late last year.

Sources in Gaza claim the group consists of roughly 100 armed men who operate with the tacit approval of the IDF. When asked for comment last week, an IDF spokesperson declined to respond to these claims.

The Abu Shabab militia operates east of destroyed Rafah, between the Morag and Philadelphi routes.Credit: Photo: Planet Labs PBC

In recent weeks, Abu Shabab launched two Facebook pages where he publishes anti-Hamas and anti-Palestinian Authority messages while promoting his militia's efforts to provide security and distribute aid to civilians.

Videos shared on these pages show his fighters wearing new uniforms, helmets, and vests emblazoned with insignias that include the Palestinian flag. Abu Shabab also shared the original Haaretz report about his group.

Some videos show the militia stopping and inspecting convoys from the Red Cross and the UN, guarding the Salah al-Din road, Gaza's main north-south route, and conducting armed formation drills.

In mid-April, four militia members were killed by an explosive device planted by Hamas. Although Hamas initially claimed the attack targeted an undercover Israeli unit, it later emerged that the casualties were members of Abu Shabab's group.

Yasser Abu Shabab next to a truck carrying hundreds of sacks of flour distributed to local residents, in a video he posted on his Facebook account this week

In a video posted this week, Abu Shabab claimed the four were killed while clearing homes in Rafah in preparation for the return of displaced residents. The video also described the deceased as former security officers or Palestinian Authority employees.

On Tuesday, Abu Shabab released another video showing his forces setting up a tent camp and unloading food from a truck. The accompanying message stated that "the popular forces have returned to eastern Rafah under the umbrella of Palestinian legitimacy, led by commander Yasser Abu Shabab."

Displaced Palestinians were invited to join the camp to receive food, shelter, and protection. Phone numbers were provided for coordination. The video also showed the distribution of hundreds of sacks of flour and food packages.

One of the senior members of the Abu Shabab militia, holding a shortened M16 rifle, alongside Red Cross personnel east of Rafah, two weeks ago.

Haaretz identified the tent camp's location in satellite imagery from Planet Labs, showing 16 tents under construction in a zone long controlled directly by the IDF – between the east-west Morag and Philadelphi routes, about five kilometers northeast of the Kerem Shalom crossing.

Previous efforts by Palestinian journalists and online activists to geolocate Abu Shabab's militia videos confirmed that they were also filmed in this same area (marked in red on the attached map).

UN maps from late 2023 designated the zone as "hazardous" due to frequent looting of aid convoys. In a past interview with The Washington Post, Abu Shabab admitted to looting some of the aid in order to feed local families.

The IDF declined to comment on the militia's activity in Gaza and referred Haaretz to the Shin Bet, which also refused to respond.

On Wednesday, Israeli lawmaker Avigdor Lieberman, a former defense minister, claimed that Israel has supplied weapons to ISIS-affiliated Gazan criminal gangs.

In an interview with Kan Bet radio, Lieberman said, "Israel gave assault rifles and small arms to crime families in Gaza on Netanyahu's orders. I doubt it went through the Security Cabinet. No one can guarantee these weapons won't eventually be turned against Israel."

Since the start of the war, there have been several reports suggesting that Netanyahu and senior IDF officials have considered transferring local governance in Gaza to large clans or families as a counterweight to Hamas.

In response to Lieberman's allegations, Netanyahu's office said: "Israel is working to defeat Hamas through various means, as recommended by all heads of the security establishment."

The two pages of Yaser Abu Shabab, who describes himself as ‘Commander-in-Chief of the Popular Forces’, created on Facebook/Meta with a small dose of artificial intelligence.
The private one : 

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61575907420429

The official one:

https://www.facebook.com/Popularforces2024

SANTIAGO GONZÁLEZ VALLEJO EU and Spain associated to war crimes

Santiago González Vallejo, 10/2/2025

The author is a Spanish economist who works at the Unión Sindical Obrera trade union and is a member and co-founder of the Comité de Solidaridad con la Causa Árabe (Arab Cause Solidarity Committee).

For many years now, we have accused the European Union of being an accomplice in the occupation and colonization of the Territories occupied by Israel (Palestine territory prior to 1967, the Syrian Golan Heights and the Shebaa Farms in Lebanon), as well as the blockade of Palestinian Gaza. This is confirmed by its global inaction and its de facto support for Israel in terms of arms trade, security agreements, maintenance of trade relations – including with the settlements in the Occupied Territory, in both directions – partnership in programs of all kinds or granting aid. All of this forces us to consider that the EU is not only complicit but also a party to Israel's war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Dragan

The European Union (as well as NATO), through these agreements, has been considering Israel as a partner, ally, etc., despite it being an occupying state with supremacist laws that discriminate against Palestinians and despise international law, including the right of return.  All of this is the origin and cause of the injustice suffered by the Palestinian people.  The European Union and other Western countries, by siding with Israel, are participants in the crimes of repression and continuous violence that Israel exercises to maintain that territorial domination.

An excuse sometimes alleged in the abandonment of accepted values of the European Union (such as the respect of international law, democracy or shared prosperity) is that many Europeans are trapped ideologically in accepting the Israeli narrative that they are the Jews who were massacred and discriminated against in the last century. But those Europeans who discriminated and massacred Jewish citizens of their own country, are not us, today’s Europeans. They were, generically, our ancestors. This leads us to ask questions such as: do today’s European have to pay for crimes that they did not commit, or are today’s Israelis victims of those atrocities?

Israelis cannot adduce that they are the same people as those Jews who suffered the Holocaust along with other groups. Nor can the actions of these Israelis against the Palestinians, with their occupation, colonization and supremacist laws, be justified based on the suffering and attempted annihilation of Jews by Nazi and fascist supremacist ideologies (now recreated by many European and Israeli parties).

JONATHAN POLLAK“I saw that the floor was covered with blood. I felt fear run like electricity through my body. I knew exactly what was about to come”Testimonies from the Zionist gulag

Rape. Starvation. Fatal beatings. Mistreatment. Something fundamental has changed in Israeli prisons. None of my Palestinian friends who have recently been released are the same people they used to be

Jonathan Pollak, Haaretz  , 9/1/2025
Translated by Shofty Shmaha, Tlaxcala

Tlaxcala's Note: Haaretz finally translated this article from Hebrew into English, allaying our fears that they wouldn't. You can read their version here 

Jonathan Pollak (1982) was one of the founders of the Israeli group Anarchists Against the Wall in 2003. Wounded and imprisoned on several occasions, he contributes to the daily Haaretz. In particular, he refused to appear before a civilian court, demanding to be tried by a military tribunal, like a common Palestinian, which he was obviously refused.

 

Jonathan Pollak facing an Israeli soldier during a protest against the closure of the main road in the Palestinian village of Beit Dajan, near Nablus, occupied West Bank, Friday, March 9, 2012. (Anne Paq/Activestills)



Jonathan Pollak at the Jerusalem Magistrate's Court, arrested as part of an unprecedented legal campaign by the Zionist organization Ad Kan, January 15, 2020. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)



Activists hold up posters in support of Jonathan Pollak during the weekly demonstration in the Palestinian town of Beita, in the occupied West Bank, February 3, 2023. (Wahaj Banimoufleh)

Jonathan Pollak alongside his lawyer Riham Nasra at the Petah Tikva court during his trial for throwing stones during a demonstration against the Jewish settler outpost of Eviatar in Beita, occupied West Bank, September 28, 2023. (Oren Ziv)

When I returned to the territories [occupied since 1967] after a long detention following a demonstration in the village of Beita, the West Bank was very different from what I knew. Here too, Israel has lost its nerve. Murders of civilians, attacks by settlers acting with the army, mass arrests. Fear and terror around every corner. And this silence, a crushing silence. Even before my release, it was clear that something fundamental had changed. A few days after October 7, Ibrahim Alwadi, a friend from the village of Qusra, was killed along with his son Ahmad. They were shot as they accompanied four Palestinians who had been shot the day before - three by settlers who had invaded the village, the fourth by soldiers who were accompanying them.

After my release, I realized that something very bad was happening in the prisons. Over the past year, as I regained my freedom, thousands of Palestinians - including many friends and acquaintances - were arrested en masse by Israel. As they began to be released, their testimonies painted a systematic picture of torture. Fatal beatings are a recurring motif in every account. It happens in prisoner counts, during cell searches, at every movement from one place to another. The situation is so serious that some inmates ask their lawyers to hold hearings without their presence, because the path from the cell to the room where the camera is installed is a path of pain and humiliation.

I hesitated for a long time about how to share the testimonies I heard from my friends who had returned from detention. After all, I'm not revealing any new details here. Everything, down to the smallest detail, already fills volume upon volume in the reports of human rights organizations. But for me, these are not the stories of faraway people. These are people I have known and who have survived hell. None of them is the same person they once were. I seek to tell what I’ve heard from my friends, an experience shared by countless others, even while changing their names and obscuring identifiable details. After all, the fear of reprisals recurred in every conversation.

Blows and blood

I visited Malek a few days after his release. A yellow gate and guard tower blocked the path that once led to the village from the main road. Most of the other roads passing through the neighboring villages were all blocked. Only one winding road, near the Byzantine church that Israel blew up in 2002, remained open. For years, this village had been like a second home to me, and this is the first time I’ve been back there since my release. 

Malek was detained for 18 days. He was interrogated three times, and during all the interrogations, he was asked trivial questions. He was therefore convinced that he would be transferred to administrative detention - that is, without trial and without evidence, without being charged with anything, under a veneer of secret suspicion and with no time limit. This is indeed the fate of most Palestinian detainees now. 

After the first interrogation, he was taken to the Garden of Torment. During the day, the guards would remove mattresses and blankets from the cells and return them in the evening when they were barely dry, and sometimes still wet. Malek describes the cold of winter nights in Jerusalem as arrows penetrating flesh to the bones. He tells how they beat him and the other inmates at every opportunity. At every count, every search, every movement from one place to another, everything was an opportunity to hit and humiliate.

“Once, during the morning count,” he told me, ”we were all on our knees, our faces turned towards the beds. One of the guards grabbed me from behind, handcuffed my hands and feet, and said in Hebrew, 'Come on, move'. He lifted me up by the handcuffs, behind my back, and led me bent over across the courtyard next to the cells. To get out, there's a sort of small room you must go through, between two doors with a small window”. I know exactly which little room he’s talking about, I’ve passed through it dozens of times. It's a security passage where, at a given moment, only one of the doors can be opened. “So we got there,” Malek continues, “and they slammed me against the door, my face against the window. I looked inside and saw that the floor was covered in clotted blood. I felt fear run through my body like electricity. I knew exactly what was going to happen. They opened the door, one came in and stood by the window at the back, blocked it, and the other threw me inside onto the floor. They kicked me. I tried to protect my head, but my hands were handcuffed, so I didn’t really have any way of doing that. They were murderous blows. I really thought they might kill me. I don’t know how long it lasted. At some point, I remembered that the night before, someone had said to me, “When they hit you, scream at the top of your lungs. What do you care? It can’t get any worse, and maybe someone will hear and come.” So I started shouting really loud, and indeed, someone did come. I don't understand Hebrew, but there was some shouting between him and them. Then they left and he took me away. I had blood coming out of my mouth and nose”.

Khaled, one of my closest friends, also suffered from the violence of the guards. When he was released from prison after eight months’ administrative detention, his son didn’t recognize him from afar. He ran the distance between Ofer prison and his home in Beitunia. Later, he said that he hadn’t been told that the administrative detention was over, and he was afraid that there had been a mistake and that they would soon arrest him again. This had already happened to someone who was with him in the cell. In the photo his son sent me a few minutes after their meeting, he looks like a human shadow. All over his body - his shoulders, arms, back, face, legs - were signs of violence. When I came to visit him, he stood up to kiss me, but when I took him in my arms, he groaned in pain. A few days later, examinations showed edema around the spine and a rib that had healed.

In the Megiddo prison

Every action is an opportunity to hit and humiliate

Another testimony I heard from Nizar, who was already in administrative detention before October 7, and has since been transferred to several prisons, including Megiddo. One evening, the guards entered the cell next door and he could hear the blows and cries of pain from his cell. After a while, the guards picked up an inmate and threw him alone into the isolation cell. During the night and the following day, he moaned in pain and never stopped shouting “my belly” and calling for help. No one came. This continued the following night. Towards morning, the cries stopped. The next day, when a nurse came to take a look around the ward, they understood from the tumult and the screams of the guards that the inmate was dead. To this day, Nizar doesn't know who it was. It was forbidden to speak between cells, and he doesn't know what day it was. 

After his release, he realized that during the time he was detained, this detainee had not been the only one to die in Megiddo. Tawfik, who was released in winter from Gilboa prison, told me that during a check of the area by prison officers, one of the inmates complained that he wasn’t allowed out into the yard. In response, one of the officers said to him: “You want the yard? Say thank you for not being in the Hamas tunnels in Gaza”. Then, for two weeks, every day during the noon count, they took them out into the yard and ordered them to lie on the cold ground for two hours. Even in the rain. While they lay there, the guards walked around the yard with dogs. Sometimes the dogs would pass between them, and sometimes they’d actually step on the inmates lying down; they’d walk all over them.

According to Tawfik, every time an inmate met a lawyer, it came at a price. “I knew every time that the way back, between the visiting room and the ward, would add at least three more volleys of blows. But I never refused to go. You were in a five-star prison. You don’t understand what it’s like to be 12 people in a cell where even six are cramped. It’s like living in a closed circle. I didn’t mind at all what they were going to do to me. Just seeing someone else talking to you like a human being, maybe seeing something in the corridor on the way, that was worth everything to me”.

Munther Amira   - the only one here to appear under his real name - was released from prison by surprise before the end of his period of administrative detention. Even today, no one knows why. Unlike many others who have been warned and fear reprisals, Amira told the cameras about the catastrophe in the prisons, calling them cemeteries for the living. He told me that one night, a Kt’ar unit burst into their cell at Ofer prison, accompanied by two dogs. They ordered the inmates to strip down to their underwear and lie on the floor, then ordered the dogs to sniff their bodies and faces. Then they ordered the prisoners to get dressed, led them to the showers and rinsed them with cold water while clothed. On another occasion, he tried to call a nurse for help after an inmate attempted suicide. The punishment for calling for help was another raid by the Kt’ar unit. This time, they ordered the inmates to lie on top of each other and beat them with truncheons. At one point, one of the guards spread their legs and hit them in the testicles with a truncheon. 

 Hunger and disease

Munther lost 33 kilos during his detention. I don't know how many kilos Khaled lost, having always been a slim man, but in the photo sent to me, I saw a human skeleton. In the living room of his house, the light from the lamp then revealed two deep depressions where his cheeks used to be. His eyes were surrounded by a red outline, that of someone who hadn't slept in weeks. On his skinny arms hung loose skin that looked as if it had been artificially attached, like plastic wrap. Blood tests on both showed severe deficiencies. Everyone I spoke to, regardless of the prison they passed through, repeated almost exactly the same menu, which is sometimes updated, or rather reduced. The last version I heard, from Ofer prison, was: for breakfast, one and a half boxes of cheese for a cell of 12 people, three slices of bread per person, 2 or 3 vegetables, usually a cucumber or a tomato, for the whole cell. Once every four days, 250 grams of jam for the whole cell. For lunch, one disposable plastic cup with rice per person, two spoonfuls of lentils, a few vegetables, three slices of bread. At dinner, two spoonfuls (coffee, not soup spoons) of hummus and tahini per person, a few vegetables, three slices of bread per person. Sometimes another cup of rice, sometimes a falafel ball (just one!) or an egg, which is usually a bit spoiled, sometimes with red dots, sometimes blue. And that’s it. Nazar told me: “It’s not just the quantity. Even what's already been brought in isn’t edible. The rice is barely cooked, almost everything is spoiled. And you know, there are even real children there, the ones who have never been in prison. We've tried to take care of them, to give them our rotten food. But if you give a little of your food away, it's like committing suicide. In the prison there is now a famine (maja'a مَجَاعَة), and it's not a natural disaster, it’s the policy of the prison service.”

Recently, hunger has even increased. Because of the cramped conditions, the prison service is finding ways to make the cells even tighter. Public areas, canteens - every place has become an extra cell. The number of prisoners in the cells, which were already overcrowded before, has increased still further. There are sections where 50 extra prisoners have been added, but the amount of food has remained the same. Not surprisingly, prisoners are losing a third or more of their body weight in just a few months.

Food is not the only thing lacking in prison, and inmates are in fact not allowed to own anything other than a single set of clothes. A shirt, a pair of underwear, a pair of socks, a pair of pants, a sweatshirt. That's it. For the duration of their detention. I remember once, when Munther's lawyer Riham Nasra visited him, he came into the visiting room barefoot. It was winter and freezing cold in Ofer. When she asked him why, he simply said: “There aren't any”. A quarter of all Palestinian prisoners suffer from scabies, according to a statement by the prison service itself in court. Nizar was released when his skin was healing. The lesions on his skin no longer bled, but scabs still covered large parts of his body. “The smell in the cell was something you can't even describe. Like decomposition, we were there and we were decomposing, our skin, our flesh. We’re not human beings there, we’re decomposing flesh,” he says. “Now, how could we not be? Most of the time there's no water at all, often only an hour a day, and sometimes we had no hot water for days. There were whole weeks when I didn't have a shower. It took me over a month to get soap. And there we are, in the same clothes, because nobody has a change of clothes, and they’re full of blood and pus and there’s a stench, not of dirt, but of death. Our clothes were soaked with our decomposing bodies”.

Tawfik recounted that “there was only running water for an hour a day. Not just for showers, but in general, even for toilets. So, during that hour, 12 people in the cell had to do everything that required water, including natural needs. Obviously, this was unbearable. And also, because most of the food was spoiled, we all had digestive problems almost all the time. You can't imagine how bad our cell stank”.

In such conditions, the health of the prisoners obviously deteriorates. Such rapid weight loss, for example, forces the body to consume its own muscle tissue. When Munther was released, he told his wife Sana, who is a nurse, that he was so dirty that his sweat had dyed his clothes orange. She looked at him and asked, “What about the urine?” He replied, “Yes, I peed blood too.” “You idiot,” she yelled at him, ”that wasn't dirt, that was your body rejecting the muscles it had eaten”.

Blood tests on almost everyone I knew showed that they suffered from malnutrition and severe deficiencies of iron, essential minerals and vitamins. But even medical care is a luxury. We don't know what goes on in the prison infirmaries, but for the prisoners, they don’t exist. Regular treatment has simply ceased. From time to time, a nurse makes a tour of the cells, but no treatment is administered, and the “examination” amounts to a conversation through the cell door. The medical response, at best, is paracetamol and, more often, something along the lines of “drink some water”. Needless to say, there's not enough water in the cells, as there's no running water most of the time. Sometimes a week or more goes by without even the nurse visiting the block.

And if there’s little talk of rape, there’s no need to mention sexual humiliation - videos of prisoners being led around completely naked by the prison service have been posted on social networks. These acts could not have been documented other than by the guards themselves, who sought to brag about their actions. The use of the search as an opportunity for sexual assault, often by hitting the groin with the hand or metal detector, is an almost constant experience, regularly described by prisoners who have been in different prisons.

I didn’t hear about assaults on women first hand, obviously. What I have heard, and not once, is the lack of hygienic material during menstruation and its use to humiliate. After the first beating on the day of her arrest, Mounira was taken to Sharon prison. On entering the prison, everyone goes through a body search, but a strip search is not the norm and requires reasonable cause to suspect that the inmate is hiding a prohibited object. A strip search also requires the approval of the officer in charge. During the search, no officer was there for Mounira, and certainly no organized procedure to verify reasonable suspicion. Mounira was pushed by two female guards into a small search room, where they forced her to remove all her clothes, including her underwear and bra, and get down on her knees. After leaving her alone for a few minutes, one of the guards came back, hit her and left. In the end, her clothes were returned to her, and she was allowed to get dressed. The next day was the first day of her period. She was given a sanitary pad and had to make do with it for the whole of her period. And it was the same for all of them. By the time she was released, she was suffering from an infection and severe inflammation of the urinary tract.

Epilogue

Sde Teiman was the most terrible place of detention, and this is supposedly why they closed it down. Indeed, it’s hard to think of the descriptions of horror and atrocity that came out of this torture camp without thinking of the place as one of the circles of hell. But it was not without reason that the state agreed to transfer those held there to other locations - principally Nitzan and Ofer. Sde Teiman or not, Israel is holding thousands of people in torture camps, and at least 68 of them have lost their lives. Since the beginning of December alone, the deaths of four more detainees have been reported. One of them, Mahmad Walid Ali, 45, from the Nour Shams camp near Tulkarm, died just one week after his arrest. Torture in all its forms - hunger, humiliation, sexual assault, promiscuity, beatings and death - does not happen by chance. Together, they constitute Israeli policy. This is the reality.

 

TESTIMONIAL A Gazan woman’s diary: “We died all kinds of deaths”

Nour Z Jarada has lived in Gaza all her life. For  the French daily “Libération”, this psychologist from Médecins du Monde France writes about her daily life in the war-torn Palestinian enclave. Episode six: the anguish of winter and a hint of hope.

by Nour Z Jarada, Gazan psychologist for Médecins du Monde France, Libération  , 12/31/2024
Translated by Fausto Giudice, Tlaxcala

December is drawing to a close and we’re facing a second winter of war. I could never have imagined going through another winter like this one. Winter used to be my favorite season. When asked what my favorite time of year was, I always answered winter. Always. I loved its rain, its coolness, its comfort. I wished it was always winter. But things are different now. I can no longer afford the luxury of loving winter. I no longer have a warm home, winter clothes, blankets or even heating. I no longer have our streets, our gatherings, or our warm cups of tea shared with loved ones. From now on, none of us here can afford the luxury of loving winter.

I remember crying my eyes out at the first rain of the year. The sadness of another winter while we’re still at war was unbearable. My heart broke for us, for the families in the tents. That night, I saw flooded tents on the news and thanked God for the fragile roof over my head. Yet my heart broke for our children and families who spent the night in the icy water, waiting for dawn or simply for the rain to stop. As those dark hours stretched on, a child’s cries rang out from a nearby tent. They pierced the silence, filled with sorrow and pain. I didn’t know if the child was cold or hungry, but I couldn’t sleep. All nights are terrifying in wartime: they are merciless, cruel and endless. As we all know, we dread the long hours between now and morning and pray for the night’s horrors to come to an end.

Displaced people’s tents after heavy rain in Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip, December 30. (Madji Fathi/NurPhoto. AFP)

Resilience

Today, after more than a year and two months of war in Gaza, I’m a different person. Unfortunately, I’m not sure whether this change is a good or a bad thing. On the one hand, grief weighs heavily on my heart, a wound so deep that not even time can erase it. This injustice opens the door to a myriad of questions racing through my mind: Why? How is it that the geographical space in which we were born, to which we belong, our race, our color, our religion, are all factors that determine our destiny? Our suffering, our trauma? How can these elements, which we have not chosen, control the course of our lives? How can we heal from such merciless traumas? How can I go on living without my loved ones? These questions haunt me, all the more so when I imagine the end of the war.

Yet I’ve also discovered a resilience I never imagined I possessed. I endured fear, displacement, loss, grief, tears and unimaginable sorrow. I’ve faced it all patiently, even when I had no choice. Through it all, it was my unshakeable faith that carried me through, a conviction that there is a reason for everything, even if only God knows it. We believe in God. Every trial we go through carries with it a wisdom we can’t grasp with our minds. We turn our hearts over to God, even when the trial seems humanly beyond our capacity. This faith has driven me to persevere, to keep working, to fight and to support those around me.

Security nowhere to be found

In this war, adversity knows no bounds: the famine in northern Gaza during the year was unthinkable. People were forced to eat tree leaves, desperately searching for the slightest remnant of flour. The “flour massacre” even made international headlines, with people eating blood-stained bread. Countries sent aid by sea, our people drowned trying to reach it. Is it really possible that Gaza, once celebrated for its hospitality and generous cuisine, is now a land of starvation? Yet this is the reality we face. We have died all kinds of deaths. And today, famine has caught up with us in southern and central Gaza, areas supposedly “safe” for displaced civilians. But safety remains elusive.

Food is becoming increasingly scarce, and prices are rising so much that they are becoming unaffordable for most of us. Flour, once a staple, is now hard to come by. Those who manage to obtain small quantities often find it infested with worms or insects, but we sift it before cooking and eating it because we have no alternatives.

I’ve even joked bitterly with colleagues that I’d rather die in an air strike than starve to death: it would be quicker and less painful. What greater injustice can there be than to live in a world where we think about a way to die, about the least unbearable way to leave this life?

Maybe I’ll never write again

Since the beginning of December, there have been a few glimmers of hope; rumors of a potential ceasefire. But nobody dares to be optimistic anymore. That’s another change. Just a few months ago, I was one of those hopeful people. Every time I heard rumors of a ceasefire, I rushed to pack my suitcase, ready to go home. But each time, my heart was broken. Today, I’ve learned not to hope. In psychology, this is called learned helplessness: when repeated failures or hardships leave a person in a state of helplessness, unable to believe that things will change.

Yet I still dream of the end of the war. I dream of returning to my home in northern Gaza, of seeing my grandmother again. She’s over 70 and a resilient, gentle and very religious woman. I haven’t seen her since October 7th. My heart longs to hold her close to me. I can’t imagine how she has endured terror, hunger and grief. Sometimes we talk on the phone, but it’s too painful. We both cry and the calls end with more fear and longing.

At this moment, I imagine myself writing to you next time from the north of Gaza. Maybe a little piece of the hopeful Nour is still there in me. Or maybe I’ll never write again. No one knows what the future is made of. But what I do know is that oppression always ends one day. As the poet Aboul-Qacem Echebbi  wrote: “If it happens to the people, one day, to want to live, fate will have to answer.” And as God promises in the Qur’an: “Next to difficulty is, surely, ease!” Despite all we endure, we cling to our strength and resilience. Every day, we put aside our grief to take on our roles and reach out to those around us. Helping those the world has forgotten gives meaning and purpose to our lives.

Such a simple desire

Last month, a moment seared itself into my memory. A young man visiting our clinic lost his entire family and his right leg in the war. The only survivor, he now lives alone in a flimsy tent. Despite this unimaginable loss, he represents a source of hope for others. During psychosocial sessions, he learned breathing exercises and coping techniques. We’ve noticed that he’s now teaching these exercises to other patients in the clinic’s waiting room, and sharing how he’s coping with his grief. His strength inspires me.

At times, my colleagues and I allow ourselves to dream of returning to our devastated city. We talk about the first things we would do when that day comes. First and foremost, we want to honor the memory of our dear colleague, Dr Maisara, by digging his body out of the rubble of his house after more than a year and giving him a dignified burial. Then we’ll seek shelter; perhaps in tents and work together to rebuild our lives and the clinic, to continue serving our people. As for me, I’ll see my grandmother again. It’s such a simple but profound desire that gives me the strength to continue enduring the hardships.

Honestly, after all this, if I had the choice, I’d choose to be a Ghazawiya, to be a Palestinian, from this land I love again and again, today and forever.