West Bank Families Fear for Imprisoned Relatives After Seeing How Israel Returned Bodies to Gaza

When Gaza Strip received the return of hundreds of bodies of Palestinians detained or killed by Israel as part of the recent cease-fire agreement, many families across the West Bank found themselves gripped by fresh terror—not only about the fate of the deceased, but about their loved ones still held inside Israeli prisons.

For many West Bank families, the images and reports emerging from Gaza stirred deep questions: if Israel’s treatment of the bodies returned was so harsh, what might be happening to those still alive behind bars?

Stories of anguish and uncertainty

Saeed Tazaza, a father from Jenin whose son Ahmed was arrested in late 2024, told The New Arab his story with visible distress. After a home raid, Ahmed was taken to an Israeli military camp for “interrogation” but ended up in administrative detention for six months, renewed again for another six months. Eventually the family received word from the Palestinian Liaison Office that Ahmed had died in prison.

Saeed recounts a chilling testimony from a released prisoner:

“They unleashed unmuzzled police dogs on my son to tear his face apart … The assault didn’t happen just once. … According to testimonies … police dog attacks occurred daily against prisoners, and Ahmed was one of them.”

He believes his son’s death was the result of deliberate medical neglect, after suffering from injuries and bleeding without adequate treatment.

According to the National Campaign for the Recovery of the Bodies of Palestinian Martyrs, Israel is still holding the bodies of 735 documented martyrs in its cemeteries and morgues, including 86 killed in Israeli prisons (10 women, 67 children), and additional hundreds of undocumented individuals, especially from Gaza.

The families are haunted by what they call “cemeteries of numbers” inside Israel—anonymous burial sites where Palestinian bodies are given only numbers, buried near the surface, exposed to weather and wild animals. The New Arab

Azhar, mother of Abdul Hamid Abu Surur (killed in April 2016), describes sifting through social media photos of returned bodies, hoping to spot her son though she knows he was buried long ago in one of these anonymous sites. She says:

“The scenes we saw were cruel. They made us wonder what they did to our sons’ bodies, how they were buried, how long they remained in the morgues, and how they were transferred…”

Human-rights organisations and civil-rights groups have called the manner in which some bodies were returned “horrifying and disturbing,” with allegations of extrajudicial executions and even suspicion of organ theft.

Hurriyat Centre for Civil Rights director Hilmi al-Araj argued that the killings and the returned remains send a message: that the occupation considers itself above the law and willing to commit war crimes without accountability.

The shadow cast by the returned bodies has shifted the focus from those who died to those still alive behind bars: the fear that their fate might be even worse than what’s visible. For the families, every piece of information—photo, testimony, rumor—brings hope and terror in equal measure.

Israel bans Red Cross visits to detained Palestinians

In the meantime, Israel has barred the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) from visiting Palestinian detainees, including those classified as “unlawful combatants” who are held indefinitely without charge in military detention centres.

The order — issued just hours before Israel’s top court was due to hear a petition on the matter — bars the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) from visiting thousands of Palestinian detainees named in an attached list.

In effect, the decision formalises the status quo that has existed since the war in Gaza began following Hamas’s unprecedented 7 October 2023 attack on Israel.

The ICRC says it has been denied access to detainees since the October 2023, except for limited pre-release interviews conducted under ceasefire or prisoner-exchange arrangements. “The purpose of the ICRC visits to places of detention and those deprived of their liberty is purely humanitarian,” the organisation said in a statement.

“We aim to assess the treatment and conditions of detainees, to work with detaining authorities to ensure compliance with international standards, and to help restore contact between detainees and their families.”
– ICRC

Under Israeli law, the classification of “unlawful combatants,” introduced in 2002, permits the indefinite detention of individuals without charge in military detention centres.

©TNPP