Testicles removed, urinated on by dogs, rapes: Palestinian detainee recounts abuse in Israeli dungeons
“I witnessed two detainees being assaulted by soldiers inserting a baton into their anus.”
As first-hand testimonies of extreme physical, psychological, and sexual abuse in Israeli rape-and-torture dungeons continue to emerge, another Palestinian detainee from Gaza has recounted being urinated on by dogs, having his testicles removed, being forced to lick the spit off Israeli boots, and witnessing the anal rape of fellow detainees. His account further exposes the systematic dehumanisation endured by Palestinians in Israeli dungeons, particularly after October 7.
Ahmed Abdel Fattah Ahmed Jabri’s ordeal began when the Israelis invaded Khan Yunis in early December 2023, eventually forcing him to flee with his wife and three children. “On 7 January 2024, my wife, children, and I fled to the headquarters of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) in the centre of Al-Amal neighbourhood, seeking safety, as many people were doing,” he told the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) in a testimony published on Wednesday. “A few days later, my brothers and their families joined us there.”
Siege of hospital
During their displacement, Imad, Ahmed’s brother, was injured, while many “others were killed when an Israeli drone targeted a group of civilians on Al-Qudra Street.” Imad had to be admitted to Al-Amal Hospital, which is affiliated with the PRCS, and Ahmed accompanied his brother there along with his nephew, Amjad.
Through the course of the ongoing genocide in Gaza, the Israelis have repeatedly attacked hospitals as a first order of business while invading any locality in the besieged enclave. Al-Amal Hospital would be no different. “On 5 February 2024, Israeli military vehicles advanced towards the PRCS headquarters, besieged it, and ordered the displaced persons inside to evacuate and move westward to Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis,” Ahmed told PCHR. “People left, including my family and relatives. I remained behind with my nephew Amjad, 13 years old, to accompany his injured father, Imad.”
The familiar story of the Israelis abducting doctors, patients, and their companions, and humiliating them, played out at the hospital. “After the evacuation, only patients, their companions, and medical staff remained—around 200 people in total,” Ahmed said. “During the Israeli soldiers’ incursion into the compound, they forced us down to the ground floor, to the ophthalmology department, bound our hands behind our backs with plastic ties, and questioned us about our personal details. Israeli soldiers arrested five people—three from the medical staff and two companions—then left the PRCS compound. We remained there, and my brother Imad began to recover.”
But it would get worse for Ahmed. Six weeks later, the Israelis returned. They besieged the hospital and shot at patients, their relatives, doctors, and workers. Ahmed’s brother, Imad, who was making a recovery from the earlier injury, was shot in the face by an Israeli sniper from another building.
“At around 2:00 a.m. on 24 March 2024, Israeli occupation forces returned and besieged the PRCS building for a second time, amid heavy gunfire and fire belts around and inside the compound,” Ahmed recalled. “They ordered us to leave and head towards Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis. Chaos ensued, and we did not know what to do. While attempting to exit the building, one PRCS staff member from the Abu Eisha family was shot in the chest and fell to the ground. My brother Imad tried to help him, but as Imad raised his head, he too was shot in the face by a sniper positioned on one of the surrounding buildings. His injury was severe. I searched for a doctor but found that they had already left the compound.”
Ahmed’s abduction
While attempting to take his injured brother to a place of safety, Ahmed encountered the Israelis, who were operating a checkpoint close to the hospital. They forced Ahmed to abandon his brother and eventually abducted him and his 13-year-old nephew:
My nephew Amjad, some friends, and I placed my brother on a stretcher and carried him out. As we exited the PRCS compound, tanks surrounded us on both sides of the road. We walked westward for about 500 metres until we reached the Social Affairs building, which the soldiers had turned into their base, converting the adjacent road into a checkpoint separating Al-Amal neighbourhood from the coastal area. The soldiers ordered us to place my brother on the ground and approach them. I put my brother down and walked towards a soldier visible to us from a window of the Social Affairs building. He asked for my ID card, which I did not have. He then asked for my name, which I gave. After checking my name on a phone he was holding, he ordered me to strip, gave me a white overall, and ordered me to wear it. They then bound my hands behind my back with plastic ties, blindfolded me with a cloth, and took me to the basement of the Social Affairs building. They arrested my nephew Amjad but released him after two hours. I was the first to be arrested.
In the basement, the Israelis probed Ahmed about whether he had any ties to the resistance or knowledge of the tunnel network, and beat him “with fists and a baton.” Then, they put him inside a tank with two other detainees and drove them for about an hour to a facility before proceeding to collect his biometrics and photograph him. There, they shackled him to a chair before three Israelis started another round of interrogation with the same line of questioning.
“The interrogation proceeded in rounds: he would ask questions, leave, then return,” Ahmed said. “Whenever I answered ‘I don’t know,’ I was beaten all over my body.”
Sexual abuse and torture
Ahmed was subjected to horrific sexual abuse that included punching and squeezing his testicles and inserting a pen cap into his urethra, causing him to faint. After waking on a hospital bed, Ahmed discovered that one of his testicles had been surgically removed:
During the interrogation, whenever I denied knowing anyone from Islamic Jihad or Hamas or knowing about tunnels, the two soldiers behind me would beat me all over my body, focusing on punching my groin (testicles), squeezing them, and attempting to insert a pen cap into my urethra. This was repeated multiple times (I do not recall how many). Each time, I screamed in severe pain, feeling dizzy and close to losing consciousness. The last time, I could not endure it and lost consciousness. When I regained consciousness, I found myself in a hospital bed— I do not know the hospital’s name or location—shackled by my hands and feet to the bed, with a guard posted at the door. I learned that I had undergone surgery and that one of my testicles had been removed. I remained in the hospital for a week in this condition. My restraints were only removed when using the bathroom or eating. Food consisted of three meals a day, each a single chocolate-flavoured pudding cup. As for treatment, I was given one anti-inflammatory pill per day.
After a week at the hospital, Ahmed was transferred to the barracks of the notorious Sde Teiman dungeon, as he only learned later. His three months at the torture dungeon in the Negev desert was full of beatings and other forms of abuse.
I spent three months in Sde Teiman, during which I was subjected to repeated interrogations, beatings, and humiliation by occupation forces. I do not recall how many times. The first occurred ten days after my return from the hospital. During one interrogation, an interrogator extinguished his cigarette on the back of my neck while asking me the same questions as before. Whenever soldiers came to take me for interrogation, they would take me out of the barracks, bind my hands behind my back, blindfold me, and assault me with fists, boots, punches, and kicks while escorting me to the interrogation rooms.
I was also subjected to stress positions: my hands bound behind my back while standing; being forced to kneel; or standing with my bound hands raised above my head. If I tried to rest my hands, I would be beaten and insulted. I would remain in one of these positions for one to two hours, depending on the soldier’s mood.
Forced to lick spit off boots
In order to humiliate the Palestinian detainees, the Israelis, aside from physical beatings, would hurl abuse and insults, and force them to lick spit off their boots:
We were beaten with fists, kicks, batons, electrocuted, and verbally abused with obscene insults.
During transfers between barracks, soldiers would spit on their boots and order detainees to lick them. This happened to me about 20 days after I was transferred again to Sde Teiman. I refused to lick the spit, so a soldier punched me several times and shoved me into the barracks.
Recalling a typical day in detention, Ahmed said that the detainees were forced to sit on their buttocks from dawn until midnight, with their hands in cuffs, and were prevented from talking to fellow detainees:
During detention, our day began at 5:00 a.m., when we gathered our very thin mattresses and blankets and set them aside. Roll call took place four times a day: at 5:00 a.m., noon, after sunset, and at midnight. We were forced to sit all day on our buttocks with our legs stretched forward and our hands shackled with iron cuffs. Movement and talking to neighbouring detainees were prohibited. We remained seated like this until midnight.
To use the bathroom, the detainees had to ask for permission and their wait could last as long as three hours before being permitted, while “showering was allowed once a week for no more than four minutes—just enough for water to touch your body before you had to get dressed, otherwise you would be beaten.”
Urinated on by dogs
Recounting more harrowing abuse, Ahmed said that the Israelis let dogs walk over the bodies of the detainees, during which the dogs would urinate on them.
We were subjected to suppression at least twice a week. It would begin with soldiers ordering us to lie face down with our hands over our heads and throwing stun grenades. Soldiers would then enter with dogs muzzled with metal restraints; the dogs would walk over our bodies and urinate on us. Afterwards, certain detainees’ numbers would be called, they would be taken aside, beaten severely, and dogs would be released at them to terrorise them. I was severely beaten, attacked by dogs, and hung from a fence more than once. Each suppression lasted about half an hour.
Kangaroo courts
After 75 days of abuse at Sde Teiman, an occupation court accused him of being a threat to the “State of Israel” during a hearing via phone. After three months at Sde Teiman, he was transferred to Ofer Prison. The abuse continued during the transfer. Ahmed recalled:
I was seated with my head between my knees like the other detainees; we were 30 in total. The bus journey lasted about three hours, during which we were beaten with punches and slaps and subjected to electric shocks. Soldiers ordered us to sing. The bus stopped when we reached Ofer Prison, as I later learned, and the beatings continued as we were unloaded.
The conditions inside Ofer were an improvement on Sde Teiman, but there was one commonality: “We were subjected to suppression and torture at least twice a week, including during roll call, similar to Sde Teiman.”
Anal rape
Horrifyingly, Ahmed witnessed two detainees being raped with batons. One of the detainees subjected to such abuse never returned.
During my detention, I witnessed two detainees being assaulted by soldiers inserting a baton into their anus. One of them was with me in Ofer. He was called out and later returned to the room bleeding heavily from his anus and told me what had happened. Half an hour later, they took him again, and he never returned; I did not see him afterwards.
After nine months in Ofer, during which he never got a chance to defend himself despite two appearances in Israeli kangaroo courts via mobile phones, Ahmed was transferred to Negev Prison. The same pattern of beatings during prisoner transfers was repeated on the way to Negev.
Although conditions at Negev were better than at Sde Teiman and Ofer, the Israelis fired rubber bullets at the detainees when they celebrated the announcement of the ceasefire in Gaza. “We cheered in joy, and soldiers stormed in and fired rubber bullets at us,” Ahmed said. “I was hit by a rubber bullet in my right shoulder. I remained in Negev Prison for four and a half months.”
Back to Sde Teiman
Ahmed was again sent to Sde Teiman, where his hands remained shackled for the first three days. It got worse: “At around 10:00 p.m. on my first day back in Sde Teiman, soldiers came, called my name, threw a stun grenade near me inside the room, ordered me to step back with my hands over my head, then dragged me out, changed my hand restraints to the back, shackled my feet, and placed me in a cell measuring 1.5×1.5 metres with a toilet.”
The routine of physical abuse remained the same as during Ahmed’s first stint at Sde Teiman. “We were awakened at 5:00 a.m. and remained seated until midnight,” Ahmed told PCHR. “Roll call was conducted four times daily, and food consisted of three meals as before, in insufficient quantities. I spent, to the best of my recollection, about 70 days or more in Sde Teiman.”
There were daily beatings, morning and evening. As punishment, the Israelis would shackle Ahmed for three successive days, forcing him to be dependent on fellow detainees for his basic needs:
We were subjected to daily suppression, morning or evening. It would begin with stun grenades, and we were ordered into the corridor to kneel with our hands raised. If I tried to lower my hands due to exhaustion, I would be beaten with punches and kicks for hours. As punishment, I was sometimes restrained with my hands and feet bound behind my back for three consecutive days inside the room, during which fellow detainees helped me eat, drink, and use the bathroom.
Free at last
On December 7, 2025, after enduring nearly two years across a number of Israeli dungeons, Ahmed was released into Gaza with five other detainees.
“When my restraints were removed, a soldier gave me water and a biscuit and told me to run towards the gate of Kerem Shalom Crossing,” Ahmed said of the day he was eventually freed. “I ran, along with the other detainees, and found the International Committee of the Red Cross waiting for us. They transported us by bus to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah.”
While in Negev Prison, Ahmed found out about the fate of his brother, Imad, whom he had accompanied at Al-Amal Hospital and who was shot in the face while trying to help an injured person. The Israelis had forced Ahmed and his nephew to leave the stretcher-bound Imad at the gate before abducting them.
Ahmed recalled:
“As for my brother Imad, during my detention in Negev Prison, after some detainees were transferred to us, one of them told me that he had been detained with my nephew Nidal Imad Jabri, 21 years old, who informed him that my brother Imad had died of his wounds seven to ten days after my arrest.”
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