An empty seat at the table: Gaza's prisoners' families mark another Ramadan without loved ones

When the Maghrib call to prayer echoed across the shattered skyline on the first evening of Ramadan, Um Ghassan, a Palestinian woman from the north of Gaza, laid out a modest iftar from the little food she had managed to secure. Lentil soup, a small plate of rice, and pickles. And as she has done every year since 2023, she placed an extra plate at the table.

No one has touched it in 820 days.

Her son Ghassan was taken on 21 November 2023 at an Israeli checkpoint while the family was fleeing Israel's bombardment in northern Gaza. He was 23 at the time. He has since turned 26 behind bars.

"He used to reach the table before all of us in Ramadan," his mother told The New Arab. "He would wake his siblings for suhoor and tease me while helping prepare the soup. Now I want to hear his voice again." 

This is the family's third Ramadan without him. 

Ramadan in Gaza is meant to be a month of gathering, of extended families crowding around tables, of late-night prayers and laughter spilling into the streets. 

For families of prisoners, it has become a season of waiting.

"We were running from the bombing [...] We were carrying what we could, looking for safety. We did not know that the checkpoint would divide our lives into before and after," the 49-year-old mother of four recalled. 

With every rumour of a prisoner exchange, every announcement of a potential deal, she allows herself to hope, briefly, that Ghassan's name might appear on a release list. Each time, it does not.

"I do not know why he is still there," she said quietly. "He did not belong to any faction. He was a university student. He excelled in his studies. Maybe that bothered them [the Israeli army]. But I have never stopped believing he will come back."

Crisis behind bars

Ghassan is among more than 9,000 Palestinians currently held in Israeli prisons, according to Palestinian prisoners' rights groups.

Among them are hundreds held under administrative detention without charge or trial, as well as dozens of women and children.

Behind each statistic is a table with an empty chair.

In another neighbourhood of Gaza, Um al-Majd is marking her second Ramadan without her husband. 

She cooks his favourite dish and places his photograph near the plates. Their young son asks her every day whether his father will break his fast with them this year.

"I do not know how to explain prison to him," she says. "I do not know how to explain waiting."

Ramadan evenings were once filled with plans for the future, conversations about their children, about building a better life. 

Now, she sits after iftar staring at the clock, imagining how her husband might be breaking his fast inside a cell.

"Does he have enough food?" she asks. "Can he fast properly? If he gets sick, will anyone treat him?"

The uncertainty is its own form of punishment.

Since the outbreak of Israel's genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023, Palestinian rights organisations say conditions inside Israeli prisons have deteriorated sharply. 

The Palestinian Prisoners Club reports an "unprecedented" escalation in solitary confinement, overcrowding, and reductions in food rations. Family visits have been almost entirely suspended.

According to the group, prison authorities have further restricted conditions during Ramadan, including reducing yard time and imposing collective punishments. Chronic illnesses have reportedly worsened amid severe limits on medical care.

For families already living through war and displacement, such reports deepen the sense of dread.

Incitement

The anxiety intensified following repeated statements by Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir calling for harsher treatment of Palestinian prisoners. 

A few days ago, he publicly advocated tightening restrictions and curtailing what he describes as remaining "privileges."

He sparked widespread alarm with boastful remarks suggesting the execution of what he termed "al-Qassam's elite," referring to members of Hamas' armed wing.

For prisoners' families, such rhetoric is not merely abstract politics.

"When I hear them talk about executions, it feels like my heart is being pulled from my chest," Um al-Majd said. "Even if my husband is not among those they mean, it shows the spirit of revenge they are dealing with."

The Palestinian Prisoners Club has condemned such statements as incitement that heightens the risks facing detainees, warning that political discourse is increasingly translating into punitive prison policies.

The consequences are not confined to prison walls. In Gaza, where much of the territory lies in ruins after more than two years of devastating war that has killed over 72,000 Palestinians, according to the health ministry, the detention of a son or husband often means the loss of a primary breadwinner.

Um Ibrahim, whose husband has been imprisoned for nearly two years, describes living "between two fears."

"We fear for his life inside prison, and we fear for our future here," she told TNA. 

With Gaza's economy shattered and unemployment soaring, families of prisoners struggle to survive. Yet many feel their cause has slipped down the political agenda amid ceasefire negotiations and broader diplomatic manoeuvring.

"It is as if they have been forgotten, but every prisoner has a family waiting. Many have children who do not know what their future will be," Um Ibrahim said. 

Two Ramadans

On the first night of Ramadan, Gaza's streets quieten after iftar. The rubble-strewn neighbourhoods fall into a fragile calm. But inside homes where sons and husbands are absent, prayers grow louder. The smell of soup mingles with tears.

Families here live through two Ramadans: one marked by fasting, prayer, and the rituals of survival; another, imagined behind bars, governed by isolation and restriction.

At sunset each evening, the same question circles dining tables across the enclave: Will this be the last Ramadan spent apart? No one can answer it.

Still, mothers straighten untouched plates, wives' smooth photographs, and children ask when their fathers are coming home.

And as the call to prayer fades into Gaza's darkened horizon, hope, fragile but unextinguished, remains seated at the table.