As the world marks Palestinian Prisoners’ Day, the Palestinian Return Centre (PRC) urgently warns of a deepening crisis of mass arbitrary detention that has turned Israeli prisons into black sites of abuse, collective punishment, and psychological torture for over 9,500 Palestinians—many of them children, women, and the elderly.

In the shadow of Israel’s brutal assault on Gaza since October 2023, a campaign of mass arrests and forced disappearances has swept across the occupied Palestinian territories. Families have been torn apart. Entire communities are held hostage.

Hundreds of detainees are being held without charge or trial under Israel’s notorious administrative detention system—detained indefinitely, based on "secret evidence" they cannot challenge.

In the wake of Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza, hundreds of Palestinians from the besieged Strip have been forcibly disappeared, abducted from shelters, hospitals, and displacement camps, and transferred to undisclosed detention sites inside Israel.

Testimonies from recently released detainees paint a harrowing picture of systematic torture, including severe beatings, sleep deprivation, exposure to extreme temperatures, and prolonged blindfolding and shackling. Detainees have been stripped, starved, and denied access to lawyers or their families for weeks on end. Many are being held in makeshift military camps and shipping containers under conditions that amount to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, in flagrant violation of international law.

The deliberate targeting and abuse of Gaza’s civilian population—particularly wounded individuals, children, and aid workers—represents a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions and must be treated as a matter of urgent international accountability.

PRC demands immediate and decisive international intervention to put an end to Israel’s unlawful carceral regime. The international community must move beyond words of concern and take concrete, punitive measures against a state that has turned detention into a weapon of occupation and domination.

This is not about justice or security—it’s about breaking the Palestinian spirit. Israel’s prison system is a machine of dehumanisation that targets students, artists, human rights defenders, and ordinary civilians simply because they are Palestinian.

PRC urges the United Nations, the International Criminal Court, European governments, and civil society worldwide to:

Demand the immediate release of all Palestinian prisoners held without charge or trial, especially children, women, and the gravely ill;

Suspend all military and security cooperation with Israel that enables arbitrary arrests and detention.

Launch an independent international investigation into torture, ill-treatment, and violations of Palestinian prisoners’ rights.

Hold Israeli officials criminally accountable for systematic abuses that amount to crimes against humanity.

On this day of remembrance and resistance, we call on people of conscience around the world to raise their voices, mobilise in solidarity, and demand an end to Israel’s brutal machinery of detention.