75% of Gazan detainees held without trial are sick, disabled, or elderly citizens, Israeli data shows

An Israeli soldier moves on top of an armored vehicle near the Israeli-Gaza border, as seen from southern Israel. Israeli forces have advanced through the outer suburbs and are now a few miles from Gaza city centre.

Only a quarter of detainees from Gaza are identified as fighters by Israel’s military intelligence with many sick, disabled, and elderly among the civilians making up the rest of those held without charge or trial.

A number of children are also among those being held for long periods as well as medical workers, teachers, civil servants, media workers, and writers.

Among the most egregious cases are those of an 82-year-old woman with Alzheimer’s, who was jailed for six weeks, and of a single mother separated from her young children. When the mother was released after 53 days, she found the children begging on the streets.

The revelations have come from a joint investigation between the Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine, the Hebrew-language outlet Local Call, and The Guardian. 

The figures emerged as Gaza health authorities said Israeli fire across the enclave had killed at least 53 people on Thursday, most of them in Gaza City, where Israeli forces have advanced through the outer suburbs and are now a few miles from the city centre.

Israeli military intelligence keeps a database of more than 47,000 named individuals whom it classifies as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters.

A member of Israeli security forces fires tear gas during a military raid in the West Bank city of Nablus on Wednesday. Picture: Majdi Mohammed/AP

In May, the database listed 1,450 individuals in detention whose files were marked “arrested”. That is equivalent to just a quarter of all Palestinians from Gaza held in Israeli jails on suspicion of militant links since October 7, 2023.

At that point in May, Israel had detained 6,000 people under its “unlawful combatants” legislation, which allows indefinite imprisonment without charge or trial, official data released after legal appeals showed.

Both rights groups and Israeli soldiers have described an even smaller ratio of fighters to civilians. When photos of Palestinians stripped and shackled caused international outrage in late 2023, senior officers told Haaretz that “85%-90%” were not Hamas members.

'Disguise themselves as civilians'

The Gaza-based Al Mezan Center for Human Rights has represented hundreds of civilians held in Israeli jails. “We believe the proportion of civilians among those detained is even higher than Israel’s own figures suggest,” said Samir Zaqout, Mezan’s deputy director.

“At most, perhaps one in six or seven might have any link to Hamas or other militant factions and, even then, not necessarily through their military wings.”

Israel’s military said it had returned more than 2,000 civilian detainees to Gaza after finding no connection to militant activity. Israel was fighting enemies who “disguise themselves as civilians”, but those releases demonstrated “a thorough review process” for detentions, the military said in a statement.

It did not dispute the existence of the database or the figures for May, but claimed that “most” detainees were “involved in terrorist activities”.

Israeli politicians, the military, and the media often refer to all detainees as “terrorists”.

That includes Fahamiya al-Khalidi, an 82-year-old with Alzheimer’s who was abducted with her female carer in Gaza City in December 2023. She was held in Israel for six weeks under the unlawful combatant law, prison documentation shows.

She was disoriented, could not remember her age, and thought she was still in Gaza, according to a military medic who treated her in Anatot detention centre after she injured herself on a fence.

“I remember her limping badly toward the clinic. And she’s classified as an unlawful combatant. The way that label is used is insane,” the medic said. Photographs confirm his presence at Anatot at the time.

The Israeli military said Khalidi was targeted “based on specific intelligence concerning her personally”, but the arrest should not have gone ahead.

“The detention was not appropriate and was the result of a local, isolated error in judgment,” the military said, adding that “individuals with medical conditions or even disabilities can still be involved in terrorism”, citing Hamas’s former military chief Mohammed Deif.

• Guardian