Starved, beaten, flogged on the bare buttocks: Palestinian child recounts abuse in Israeli detention
“They kept telling us, ‘It’s okay, it’s okay, this raid happens every year.’”
The extent of Israeli barbarism against Palestinians is particularly reflected in the way they treat Palestinian children. When the Israelis are not killing them in terrorist bombings — as they have done in Gaza, killing more than 21,000 children over the past three years — they snatch them from their beds in the middle of the night and lock them away for years without charge or trial; they beat them savagely, they starve them, and they make them sign papers in Hebrew — a language they do not understand — without the presence of lawyers.
The Israelis treat children no differently from adults. Israel is the only country in the world that systematically prosecutes children in military courts.
Israel has detained 2,000 Palestinian children since October 7 amid worsening abuse, torture, and neglect
In a new factsheet on the treatment of Palestinian detainees, including males, females, and children, in Israeli dungeons, Addameer published the harrowing testimony of a child whom it identified only as B.K.
As is the norm in the Jewish state, B.K., his brother, and his father were violently beaten after the Israelis blew up the door to their home to arrest him.
B.K. recounted the congested cells, lack of food, and violence, including being beaten with belts on their bare buttocks, faced by child detainees at the hands of the Israelis:
I was arrested in April 2025 from my home, at around 2:30 a.m. They placed a machine on the door and blew it up. I was awake and heard them trying to open the door. As soon as they entered, they grabbed my father and brother and beat them. Then they grabbed me and started punching me. Three or four soldiers surrounded me and began beating me.
After fifteen minutes, they took me to the jeeps. They then transferred me to the Atsion center, where I remained sitting on my knees for approximately two hours. Afterwards, they transferred me to Magiddo Prison, and I was placed in Section 1 of Magiddo. I remained in Magiddo for one year, as I had been sentenced to one year.
During the last months of my detention, they transferred me to Section 2 of Magiddo. There are approximately 120 child prisoners in the section, and each room contains six to seven detainees. Each room has six beds. If the number of prisoners in the room exceeds six, they sleep on the floor on a mattress. There are, of course, no pillows, only blankets and mattresses.
The food is very limited. They took us out to the yard every day for 40 minutes. They allowed us to shower, and there was hot water, but not always. There were no clothes provided, so each prisoner had one set of clothes, which we would wash and wear again. The same applied to towels.
They would enter and beat the prisoners, but this happened at relatively long intervals. I remember the last time they raided us, one day before my release, which took place in February 2026.
Suddenly, while we were sleeping, they threw a stun grenade into the section, and we immediately jumped into the corner. They then opened the doors and entered. They handcuffed us one by one with a single plastic restraint behind our backs and made us sit inside the room on our knees, with our heads approximately between our legs.
After that, one of the guards pressed down on my head and pulled my hands behind my back. They removed my trousers and underwear, and another guard began beating me on the buttocks with a belt, approximately 20 times. They did the same to each prisoner in the room, one by one.
They did the same thing throughout the entire section. The raid lasted approximately three hours.
Approximately 20 soldiers from the prison guards entered the section that day. We were blindfolded, but we could see what was happening. They were wearing protective gear and masks. They kept telling us, “It’s okay, it’s okay, this raid happens every year.”
More than 370 children are currently detained by Israel in the notorious rape and torture dungeons.
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