Ref: 42/2023

Date: 20 April 2023

Time: 18:00

The Ministry of Interior in Gaza has declared the death of a detainee from Rafah in southern Gaza Strip earlier this morning due to sudden health deterioration in police detention.  As a result, he was taken to hospital and died there.

According to investigations conducted by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), at around 01:00 on Thursday, 20 April 2023, M. S. (43), from Rafah, arrived dead at Abu Yousif Annajar Hospital in the City after he was brought from the police station where he was detained.

‘A. S. (16), the detainee’s son, said to PCHR’s fieldworker that a police force arrested him and his father from their house in western Rafah at around 22:00 on Wednesday, 19 April 2023, after searching the house without showing a search warrant.  He added that he was taken with his father to Rafah Police Station, detaining him in a cell and his father in a nearby separate room.  ‘A. S. said that he was beaten and punched by the police officers who were interrogating him about possessing illegal substances (drugs) and bringing them via Rafah crossing when he and his father were on their way back from Egypt earlier in the same afternoon. He also said that he heard his father being interrogated and denying these charges as well as his father’s whines. After a while, he heard the police officers calling his father to wake up, so he thought that his father fainted during the interrogation.  A police officer then came and asked him if his father suffered any chronic diseases and he confirmed that he had hypertension and diabetes.

‘A. S. added that he was then taken to a nearby room and saw some of his father’s clothes and shoes on the ground in another room, but he did not see his father.  He said that he was forced to sign 5 papers without reading them and then released along with his 17-year-old brother, who was later arrested, after the head of their family “Mukhtar” arrived.  He said that after returning home at around 03:30 on Thursday, they learnt about their father’s death and that he was at Abu Yousif Annajar Hospital, and it was decided to refer his body to the Forensic Medicine.

At around 13:30, the deceased’s brother, who was at the Forensic Medicine Department in Gaza City, informed the family that the forensic medicine report emphasized that the cause of death is Atherosclerosis “blockage of the main artery.”

The Ministry of Interior announced opening an investigation into the death causes.

PCHR emphasizes that the General Directorate of the Rehabilitation and Reform Centers, the Ministry of Interior and Public Prosecution hold full responsibility for such incidents regardless of the causes as codified in Article (7) of the Rehabilitation and Reform Centers Law no. 6/1998, which provides that “… inmates in any prison remain under the legal guardianship of the prison director….” Additionally, this responsibility stems from Palestine’s obligations under the first rule of the UN Minimum Standard Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, (the Nelson Mandela Rules): “The safety and security of prisoners shall be ensured at all times.”

Accordingly, PCHR calls upon the Public Prosecution to open an investigation into the death circumstances, including the interrogation circumstances and alleged violence and cruel treatment the father and son were subjected to, as well as checking the appropriateness of the health measures that were taken while dealing with the detainees.  PCHR also demands the investigation results be published and all necessary legal proceedings be taken.