Prisoners are people, not political pawns

Perhaps the defining characteristic of imprisonment is powerlessness; inherent in the loss of one’s liberty is the loss of one’s agency. Whether it be somebody jailed after due process, prisoners of war, or people abducted and held arbitrarily, in each case the welfare and future of those detained are the responsibility of the people holding them.

In some of the unresolved conflicts scarring the Middle East right now, there are too many examples of prisoners and hostages being mistreated, abused or threatened. On Saturday, The National published testimony from Lebanese civilian Moustafa Rizk who accused occupying Israeli soldiers of detaining him, his father and five other people at a military base where they were allegedly subjected to torture.

“They beat me with their hands and a stick. I felt my soul leave my body,” Moustafa said, adding that soldiers interrogated him three times, with each session lasting several hours. When asked for more details, the Israeli army did not give an immediate comment, although the fearsome reputation of the country’s interrogators seems to have preceded them, with Moustafa telling The National that a threat to send him to Mossad led him to start “freaking out – my heart left my body. Everyone knows what they’re capable of in terms of torture. If they took me, I knew I wouldn’t come back”.

Meanwhile, in Palestine, even the outpouring of emotion that greeted Palestinian detainees as they were reunited with their families was overshadowed somewhat by some of the released prisoners’ gaunt and sickly appearance. In the West Bank city of Ramallah on Saturday, Israel released 183 Palestinians in exchange for three Israeli hostages freed by Hamas in Gaza earlier in the day as part of a ceasefire deal. The National saw one man who had to be carried straight to an ambulance; some prisoners had lost patches of hair; and one family, after about a minute of embracing a middle-aged man, noticed that he was not wearing shoes.

For years, Israel has faced repeated and serious accusations about the ill-treatment of Palestinians in its prisons. Last year, a detention camp at Sde Teiman military base was at the centre of alarming stories of abuses taking place in the facility. In some cases, evidence of abuse has come from the Israeli security forces themselves, with soldiers and police recording videos of themselves tormenting and humiliating Palestinian detainees.

A lack of respect for international law and prisoners’ rights has been a staple of Israeli occupation. However, it was also sometimes apparent during the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza. In several cases, Israelis have been paraded before the cameras as a piece of political theatre, sometimes amid chaotic and volatile scenes that would have been frightening for the disoriented hostages. On Saturday, three more Israeli civilians were released. Among them was Yarden Bibas, whose wife and two young sons were also abducted from the Nir Oz kibbutz during the October 7, 2023 attacks. Their fate remains uncertain and the sight of Mr Bibas, pale and flanked by armed fighters, is an unsettling one.

Prisoners, hostages or detainees – be they Palestinian, Lebanese or Israeli – are entitled to dignified treatment. All sides in these conflicts must do better, particularly in terms of ending detainment policies and practices that dehumanise prisoners. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has said that negotiations on the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire will start today when he meets with US President Donald Trump’s Middle East Envoy, Steve Witkoff, in Washington. Such talks will have a much better chance of success if all sides take action to prevent producing even more anguished and traumatised former detainees.