Palestinian Prisoners’ Club: Negev detention centre has turned into a scene of torture against detainees

The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club said the Negev detention center, where Israeli occupation authorities are holding solidarity activists from the Flotilla of Steadfastness, is one of the most prominent prisons in which hundreds of crimes and violations against Palestinian detainees have been documented.

The club added that Negev holds thousands of Palestinian detainees, including prisoners from Gaza, and pointed out that many have died there since the start of what it called the genocidal war, among them detainee Thaer Abu Asab, who died as a result of severe beatings and torture at the hands of repression units.

It said the clips reposted today by the extremist minister in the occupation government, Itamar Ben-Gvir, showing him assaulting the flotilla activists and labeling them as terrorists, are not new — whether from inside Negev or other detention centers. He has previously appeared in similar footage, using the vilest language to describe Palestinian detainees, threatening to kill them, and displaying acts of humiliation and abuse against them, the club said, noting that what happened to the activists is an extension of this policy.

The Prisoners’ Club stressed that the crimes and atrocities committed by the administration of the occupation’s prisons have exceeded all international laws and norms, saying Israeli camps and detention centers have been turned into arenas of annihilation in various forms as a result of systematic crimes carried out over the past two years.

It noted that Negev prison, historically known as the Ansar 3 detention center, was established by the occupation in 1988 following the outbreak of the Stone Intifada, and thousands of detainees were held there as confrontations escalated during that period, with many of them killed there.