Ahmed Ibrahim al-Ghandour, married with 2 children and resident of Deir al-Balah, gave his testimony to PCHR on 09 December 2023.

I used to work in a wedding hall in Ashkelon, Israel, after obtaining a work permit on 01 July 2022.

At around 07:00 on 07 October 2023, I woke up to sound of explosions from Palestinian rockets and iron dome interceptions, so my colleagues and I hid inside the hall for a week having enough food and beverages.

After a week, the hall’s owner arrived and told us that the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) would come for search. We immediately called a cab to take us to the West Bank, and at one of the checkpoints, IOF stopped the car, forced us out, and tied our hands with plastic zip ties. We remained tied at the checkpoint until midnight when we were transferred to ‘Ofer Prison, where they took my cell phone, clothes, ID card and money (11670 shekels.)

In the first 3 days in prison, they gave us only a slight of bread with little jam, a bare minimum just enough to keep us alive.

On Thursday, 17 October 2023, I was summoned for interrogation, during which, I was beaten and insulted. I was then taken to a cell, where soldiers insulted me and were passing their weapons on the cell bars making loud noise to annoy us.

On Thursday, 02 November 2023, I along with other detainees went on a hunger strike due to the little food they gave us. During the strike, a female soldier shouted at us and insulted us with worst words saying, “this is the only food you would get, eat it or you would die.”

On 09 November 2023, they put us in a tent in the open air, and the weather was very cold and freezing. We had no clothes to wear, and the soldiers from time to time were heavily firing gas canisters, severely suffocating us.

At midnight on Friday, 17 November 2023, they called 20 of us, including me, to take us to another tent, where there were buses waiting to transfer us. At first, we thought they would send us to Gaza, so we started saying Allahu Akbar, to express our joy and when the officer heard us, he decided to release all those inside the tents except 2 tents, including the one I was in. we remained there until 13:00 the next day when we got on the bus. After half an hour, the bus stopped and soldiers got on the bus starting beating and insulting us. We were then taken to another prison near Jericho, where we stayed until 21 November 2023, when they called me and others to get on the bus and took us to Kerm Shalom crossing. When they dropped us off, they unhandcuffed us and told us to run and not look back. While running, they were shooting next to us. I ran 5 kilometers until I found a cab and took it to drive me home barefoot and with very light clothes.