Palestinian prisoners continue to face systematic abuse in Israeli prisons, with rights groups warning that conditions in some facilities amount to "torture camps" amid ongoing mass detention campaigns across the occupied territories.
Building on its 2024 report 'Living in Hell', Israeli NGO B'Tselem says Palestinians in Israeli custody are subjected to sexual, physical and psychological abuse, inhuman detention conditions, deliberate starvation and denial of medical care, leading to the deaths of dozens of detainees.
Israel is currently holding at least 10,863 Palestinians classified as "security prisoners", the vast majority from the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
According to the report, the detainee population has doubled since September 2023, resulting in extreme overcrowding and a deliberate deterioration of conditions.
Since the start of Israel's war on Gaza through the end of 2025, at least 84 known Palestinian prisoners and detainees, including one minor, have died in Israeli prisons or detention facilities.
Several rights organisations say the death toll may be as high as 94, with at least six Palestinians dying during Shin Bet interrogations.
B'Tselem notes that these figures only account for detainees whose arrests are known, while the fate of hundreds of Palestinians detained during military operations remains unknown.
The report includes new testimonies from 21 Palestinians released from Israeli prisons in recent months, detailing widespread sexual abuse, including sexual violence, dog attacks and forced anal penetration with objects.
Former detainees also described routine physical abuse, including electric shocks, cigarette burns, the pouring of boiling liquids on their bodies, severe beatings and the firing of rubber bullets at close range.
Testimonies further document systematic humiliation, with prisoners filmed while naked, urinated on, spat at and verbally abused, alongside threats of violence against their family members.
Abuse extends to minors as well. The report says 74 percent of Palestinian children held in Israeli prisons have experienced violence, with around 350 minors currently imprisoned.
Israeli authorities have also continued to restrict access to food, medical treatment and the outside world. Family visits remain suspended, and access for the International Committee of the Red Cross, mandated to monitor detention conditions, has been severely limited.
As Israel's war on Gaza continues, Israeli forces have also intensified incursions across the occupied West Bank, carrying out mass arrests for alleged offences as minor as stone throwing.
B'Tselem called on the international community and institutions to take concrete action to end the systematic abuse of Palestinians in Israeli detention.