Jailed Palestinian doctor Hussam Abu Safia continues to face abuse under Israeli detention, according to his lawyer, raising renewed concerns about his safety inside the prison. Israel abducted Abu Safia on December 27, 2024 from the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza for defying Israeli orders to evacuate the hospital – one of the last remaining functioning medical facilities at the time. Israel has killed hundreds of medics and destroyed or damaged almost all of Gaza’s hospitals as part of its push to cripple the enclave’s healthcare system.
Campaigners and the family of the Palestinian doctor have routinely highlighted his physical state inside the prison, calling for his release. In July, a United Nations inquiry commission said Abu Sufia faced “continued and severe abuse”, and last month, the director general of Gaza’s Ministry of Health called for urgent action to “save” the jailed doctor’s life. So what is the latest testimony by the jailed doctor, and why does Israel continue to keep him in detention without any charge?
The jailed doctor’s latest testimony was conveyed by his lawyer, Nasser Odeh, according to a statement on Wednesday by Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI). Odeh visited Abu Safia in the Rakefet detention facility inside Nitzan Prison on August 30. Abu Safia said Israeli prison guards continue to beat him, deprive him of sleep, and threaten him against sharing the conditions of his detention with his lawyer.
Guards assault the doctor by “punching and kicking him and beating him with batons across his body, including sensitive areas”, according to the statement from PHRI. Abu Safia is also “deliberately” deprived of sleep through the use of loudspeakers and other noise throughout the night, PHRI said. Rights groups and his family have long said he shows signs of having been regularly tortured.
The doctor has been held in solitary confinement at the underground Rakefet facility, where he has been subjected to daily violence and beatings, his lawyer has said in the past. At one point, his injuries were so severe – with “fresh and serious bruises on his head, around his eyes, on his ears, and on his neck”, that his lawyer had trouble recognising him, PHRI, the Israeli rights group, said in July. In June, footage of Abu Safia appearing via videolink before an Israeli court showed him looking noticeably thinner in his face and around his abdomen.
On August 10, he was transferred from Rafeket to the prison service’s medical centre at Ramla prison, which PHRI has stated “in itself indicates serious medical needs that cannot be adequately addressed in ordinary prison wards”. The jailed Gaza doctor’s testimony comes as PHRI pursues legal proceedings demanding that an independent physician examine him – a request submitted to the Israel Prison Service on July 7 but which has not yet been approved, said the organisation. Abu Safia has also petitioned an Israeli administrative court through the group, while the Israel Prison Service recently requested additional time to submit its response.
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