The director of al-Chifa hospital in Gaza City, Mohammed Abou Salmiya, on Monday accused Israel of “torture” upon his release after more than seven months of detention.
Dozens of Palestinian prisoners, including the director of al-Shifa, the largest in the Palestinian territory, have been released by Israel and transferred to medical centers in the Gaza Strip, a medical source at Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah (center) said on Monday.
Five of them were admitted there and the others were transferred to hospitals in Khan Younes, according to this source.
Asked by AFP about the release of the prisoners and the allegations of torture, the Israeli army said it was “verifying this information”.
Mohammed Abou Salmiya claimed to have been subjected to “severe torture” during his detention in Israel and to have suffered a broken thumb.
“Prisoners are subjected to all kinds of torture,” the doctor said at a news conference. “Many prisoners have died in interrogation centers and have been deprived of food and medicine.”
“For two months, the prisoners ate only one loaf of bread a day,” he continued, adding that they were “subjected to physical and psychological humiliation.”
The doctor, arrested at the end of November, said he had been detained “without having been charged”.
Gaza hospitals have been heavily targeted since the start of Israel’s military operation in the Palestinian territory, following the bloody attack in southern Israel on October 7 by Hamas fighters from Gaza.
Israel accuses Hamas, in power in Gaza since 2007, of using hospitals for military purposes, which it denies.
The al-Chifa hospital was the scene of particularly intense raids by the army who searched it room by room.
In April and May, at least three mass graves were discovered there, according to local sources.
“Under (the) leadership (of Mr. Abou Salmiya), the hospital was the scene of numerous Hamas terrorist activities,” according to the army.
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The European Hospital of Khan Younes announced that the head of its orthopedic department, Doctor Bassam Miqdad, had also been released on Monday, “after his arrest a few months ago”.
An AFP correspondent saw men finding their loved ones and hugging them at the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.
“The release of the director of the Chifa medical center in Gaza, along with dozens of other terrorists, is a renunciation of security,” said Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben Gvir, on X.
In May, Palestinian prisoners’ rights groups claimed that two Palestinians, including a doctor from al-Shifa, had died in an Israeli prison, succumbing to “torture” and lack of medical care.
The Israeli army told AFP that it was “not aware” of such events.
It opened an investigation in December after several Palestinians arrested in Gaza died in custody since October 7.
The unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israeli soil resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data.
In response, the Israeli army launched a large-scale offensive in Gaza which cost the lives of 37,877 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to data from the Health Ministry of the Hamas-led Gaza government.
