[News] ‘Arrested, tortured and insulted’, say workers returned to Gaza by Israel

[Anti-Imperialist News]

 ‘Arrested, tortured and insulted’, say workers returned to Gaza by Israel

*Israel has released 3,200 workers from Gaza back to the coastal enclave
after they were arrested and stranded following the October 7 attacks.*
[image: Palestinian workers]
Palestinian workers who were in Israel during Hamas's October 7 attacks are
greeted as they arrive at the Rafah border after being sent back by Israel
to the strip on November 3, 2023 [Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters]
By Ruwaida Amer <https://www.aljazeera.com/author/ruwaida-amer>
Published On 3 Nov 2023
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/3/arrested-tortured-and-insulted-say-workers-returned-to-gaza-by-israel
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*Gaza Strip – *The past few weeks have been deeply traumatic for Zaki
Salameh, a Gaza resident who was working as a builder in an Israeli town
when war broke out on October 7.

In the period following the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israeli army
outposts and surrounding villages that day – and the relentless bombardment
of the Gaza Strip by Israeli forces ever since – Salameh has been arrested,
tortured and interrogated.

The 55-year-old said he “deeply regrets” working in Israel. He declined to
say where he was working for fear of reprisals by the Israeli army. He is
one of at least 18,500 residents of Gaza
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/28/thousands-of-gaza-workers-go-missing-in-israel-amid-wartime-mass-arrests>
who had permits to work outside the enclave.

Salameh said he and other Palestinian workers from the Gaza Strip were
arrested and tagged on October 8 before being taken to Ofer Prison on the
outskirts of the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah. They were summoned
for interrogation and tortured on what Salameh described as an electrical
chair for several days.

“The Israelis asked us strange questions,” he said. “They wanted to know
where the Hamas tunnels are located, where the rocket launchers are placed
and how the fighters move in and around Gaza.”

Israeli authorities also interrogated the workers about their neighbours,
their residential areas and who lives there, he continued, and threatened
to imprison them for the rest of their lives.

“They wanted to know what we knew about the Al-Aqsa Flood operation,” he
said, referring to the surprise Hamas attack that killed 1,400 Israelis.

“Some of the young men were tortured and insulted in a very brutal way,”
Salameh said. “The questions were ridiculous. The Israelis know exactly who
we are, and if we had any ties to Hamas, we wouldn’t even be granted the
work permits.”

On Friday morning, the Israeli military said it had released 3,200 workers
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/3/thousands-of-workers-sent-back-from-israel-occupied-west-bank-to-gaza>
from Gaza back to the coastal enclave through the southern Karem Abu Salem
– or Karem Shalom – crossing.

This followed an Israeli government decision the previous night that these
workers would not be granted work permits again.

“Israel is severing all contact with Gaza,” the Israeli government press
office said Thursday.

“There will be no more Palestinian workers from Gaza. Those workers from
Gaza who were in Israel on the day of the outbreak of the war will be
returned to Gaza.”
[image: Some of the workers who were stranded in Israel since the October 7
attacks walk near the Rafah border crossing]Some of the workers who were
stranded in Israel after the October 7 attacks wait near the Rafah border
crossing with Egypt to take vehicles to the city of Rafah after crossing
into the Gaza Strip on November 3, 2023 [Said Khatib/AFP] Expelled,
arrested, rounded up

Gaza residents with permits allowing them to work outside the enclave were
often labourers in construction while others worked in restaurants and
malls. The money they earned was a source of some respite after Israel’s
17-year blockade of the Gaza Strip has devastated the economy, resulting in
an almost 50 percent unemployment rate.

Those workers granted permits were approved after a strict security
examination by Israeli intelligence and the Israeli army. This meant that
after a thorough background check, each worker was confirmed as a civilian
with no political affiliations in the Gaza Strip or connections with
Palestinian armed groups and resistance factions.

But as Israel began bombing the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army began
expelling Gaza workers from their workplaces in Israeli cities.

Thousands of workers, like Salameh, were arrested and taken to Ofer Prison.
Some were rounded up and held in other undisclosed locations with no
communication with their families. Others were dumped at checkpoints in the
occupied West Bank and made their way to Palestinian cities with only the
clothes they were wearing.

Several Israeli human rights organisations, such as Gisha and HaMoked, said
some of the workers had been illegally detained in military facilities in
breach of international law. The organisations have sent petitions and
individual inquiries to Israeli authorities demanding information on the
whereabouts of the workers as well as those of other Gaza residents who had
received medical permits to enter Israel and were also rounded up.
[image: Relatives await the arrival of Palestinian workers who were
stranded in Israel]Relatives await the arrival of Palestinian workers who
were stranded in Israel since the October 7 attacks as they cross back into
the Gaza Strip at the Kerem Shalom/Karem Abu Salem commercial border
crossing [Mohammed Abed/AFP]

Fadi Bakr, who had been working in an Israeli mall, was fired from his job
on October 7. The 29-year-old was granted a work permit a year and a half
ago, and would usually spend a week at a time in Israel before returning to
his family in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis.

After his dismissal
<https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/10/15/from-friend-to-enemy-palestinians-in-israel-suspended-from-jobs-over-war>,
Bakr made his way to the occupied West Bank and stayed in Hebron with other
workers who, he said, were all distraught about the unfolding horrors in
the Gaza Strip.

“I was very worried about my young children, my wife and my family,” he
said. “The intensity of the bombing in Gaza is unlike anything we’ve ever
seen. It’s cruel and brutal, and I could barely be in touch with my family.”

Israeli forces stormed the building Bakr and the workers were staying in a
few days later and took them to Ofer Prison.

The workers were detained for 20 days before they were released.

“For the first time, I feel very afraid because I do not know whether I
will see my family again or not,” he said.

“The Israelis interrogated us day and night about our relationship with the
Hamas movement despite us having no connection to any political movement.
We only came to work.”

Workers also said they were mentally exhausted from thinking about their
families under constant Israeli bombardment in the Gaza Strip.

Bakr said he was angered by the apparent lack of action taken by the
Palestinian Authority to challenge their arrests or check on their welfare.

“How can cities, supposedly under the control of the Palestinian Authority,
be raided without question by Israeli forces?” he asked bitterly. “We had
no protection, and no Palestinian official came to our defence and did not
even ask about how we were treated or about the possibility of our release
from prison.”
[image: Palestinian workers]Palestinian workers cross back into the Gaza
Strip at the Kerem Shalom/Karem Abu Salem border crossing with Israel in
the south of the Palestinian enclave on November 3, 2023 [Mohammed
Abed/AFP] Fate of other workers unknown

The Israeli offensive has devastated the Gaza Strip and killed more than
9,000 people, including 3,826 children. More than 32,000 people have been
wounded in the attacks on densely populated areas including refugee camps
and residential homes. The United Nations estimated that 45 percent of
Gaza’s homes have been damaged or destroyed.

In addition to the blockade preventing Gaza’s access to fuel, clean water
and electricity, most of its infrastructure and main roads have been badly
damaged.

As the workers crossed into the Gaza Strip on Friday, expressions of
fatigue and exhaustion on their faces, they wondered about their families
and how to reach them.

Salameh’s family was living in the northern town of Beit Lahiya but were
forced to leave due to the heavy bombardment. They are now sheltering in
one of the UN-run schools in Khan Younis.

“There were no cars or other vehicles to take me from the far south to the
central area,” he said.

The roads are not safe, but he managed to hitch a ride on tuk-tuks and a
horse-drawn cart that the relatives of other workers had brought with them
to the crossing.
[image: Palestinian workers who were in Israel during the Hamas October 7
attack, are transported on a horse-drawn cart]Palestinian workers who were
stuck in Israel following the Hamas attacks in southern Israel are
transported on a horse-drawn cart amid fuel shortages after they arrive at
the Rafah border in Gaza [Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters]

The fate of thousands of other Gaza residents who worked in Israel remains
unknown.

Tasneem Aqel, who lives in Gaza City, last saw her father two weeks before
October 7.

“I contacted him once during the first days of the war, and he told me that
he was still working in Israel,” she said. “But then the news began
circulating about the expulsion of workers and their deportation to areas
of the West Bank.”

When Tasneem tried to call her father again, she got no response. She
managed to call her father’s friend, a fellow worker who had left with him
through the northern Beit Hanoun/Erez crossing.

“All I found out was that my dad lost his phone while in Ramallah,” she
said. “His friend said he didn’t have any news about him, so most likely,
my father is still detained in prison.”
Source: Al Jazeera
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