Photos and videos showing Palestinian men kneeling in the streets of Palestine’s Gaza with their heads bowed and hands bound behind their backs — images eerily reminiscent of Nazi Germany — sparked outrage after circulating on social media last week.
To Palestinians, the indignity of the scenes stings painfully. Among those rounded up were boys as young as 12 and men as old as 70, and they included civilians who lived ordinary lives before the war, according to interviews with 15 families of the detainees.
Palestinians incarcerated in the shattered town of Beit Lahiya, the urban refugee camp of Jabaliya and neighbourhoods of Gaza City said they were bound, blindfolded and bundled into the backs of trucks.
Some said they were taken to a camp at an undisclosed location, nearly naked and with little water.
The roundups have laid bare an emerging tactic in Israel's ground invasion of Gaza, experts say, as the military seeks to solidify control in areas where it expelled Palestinians in the north and collect intelligence about Hamas.
In response to questions about mistreatment of the detainees, the Israeli military claimed that the men were "treated according to protocol" and were given enough food and water.
Israeli forces have seized at least 900 Palestinians in northern besieged Gaza, estimated Ramy Abdu, founder of the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, which has been working to document the arrests and collect testimonies.
Photos and videos showing Palestinian men kneeling in the streets of Palestine’s Gaza with their heads bowed and hands bound behind their backs — images eerily reminiscent of Nazi Germany — sparked outrage after circulating on social media last week.
To Palestinians, the indignity of the scenes stings painfully. Among those rounded up were boys as young as 12 and men as old as 70, and they included civilians who lived ordinary lives before the war, according to interviews with 15 families of the detainees.
Palestinians incarcerated in the shattered town of Beit Lahiya, the urban refugee camp of Jabaliya and neighbourhoods of Gaza City said they were bound, blindfolded and bundled into the backs of trucks.
Some said they were taken to a camp at an undisclosed location, nearly naked and with little water.
The roundups have laid bare an emerging tactic in Israel's ground invasion of Gaza, experts say, as the military seeks to solidify control in areas where it expelled Palestinians in the north and collect intelligence about Hamas.
In response to questions about mistreatment of the detainees, the Israeli military claimed that the men were "treated according to protocol" and were given enough food and water.
Israeli forces have seized at least 900 Palestinians in northern besieged Gaza, estimated Ramy Abdu, founder of the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, which has been working to document the arrests and collect testimonies.
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