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Thousands of Israelis have signed a petition urging Defence Minister Israel Katz to immediately close military detention centres where Palestinian detainees are reportedly being tortured, leading to the deaths of dozens.

According to Anadolu Agency on Tuesday, over 4,100 Israelis signed the petition, launched by the movement Zazim – Popular Campaign in cooperation with Israel’s General Committee Against Torture.

Zazim – Popular Campaign is Israel’s largest mass campaign movement, with more than 400,000 members. The petition stated that signatories include both Jewish and Arab Israelis.
One of the most notorious military detention centres is Sde Teiman in southern Israel. It has been used by the Israeli army to hold Palestinian detainees from the Gaza Strip since the start of the war on 8 October 2023.
The petition said: “Sde Teiman is not an exceptional case. The Israeli army acknowledges that dozens of Palestinian detainees have died in military detention centres.”
“These centres can be closed with a single administrative decision by the defence minister. There is no justification for their existence, and as Israeli citizens, we will not accept torture camps on our land.”
On Monday, the Israeli organisation Physicians for Human Rights reported that at least 98 Palestinians have died in Israeli detention centres and prisons over the past two years.
Of these, 52 died in military detention centres, including 29 at Sde Teiman alone.
The report noted that many of these deaths were caused by violence, mistreatment, and medical neglect.

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This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.