Palestinian Abducted from Gaza Dies at Israel’s Sde Teiman, Raising Death Toll Among Detainees to 70 Since Start of Genocide

Occupied Palestine (Quds News Network)- A Palestinian detainee abducted from Gaza during the Israeli assault has been announced dead at Israel’s Sde Teiman detention camp, amid reports of torture and mistreatment. He is the 70th Palestinian detainee to die in Israeli prisons since the start of the genocide.

Amr Hatem Odeh, abducted from Gaza in December 2023, died in Israel’s infamous Sde Teiman military base. The Israeli military abducted Odeh, age 33 and a father of three, along with some of his family members from Gaza during an Israeli ground invasion, according to the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS).

Israel’s Torture of Palestinians

Israeli authorities have been accused of torturing Palestinian detainees. This includes being handcuffed and shackled 24 hours a day, seven days a week – even while sleeping, eating, and using the restroom. Testimonies also describe regular beatings by guards, extreme overcrowding, humiliation, and inadequate hygiene.

An Israeli reserve soldier exposed lately shocking abuses at Sde Teiman, describing it as a “sadistic torture site” where dozens of Palestinian detainees from Gaza died under brutal conditions.

The soldier described Sde Teiman as a place where “people enter alive and leave in body bags.” He said the death of detainees was no longer surprising. “The real surprise,” he added, “is if someone survives.”

He stated that Israeli occupation authorities oversee systematic abuse. According to his account, Palestinian detainees suffered starvation, untreated war wounds, and denial of basic hygiene needs.

“Some urinated and defecated on themselves because they weren’t allowed to use the bathroom,” he said.

In August 2024, the Israeli rights group B’Tselem accused Israeli occupation authorities of systematically abusing Palestinians in “torture camps”, subjecting them to severe violence and sexual assault.

Its report, titled “Welcome to Hell”, is based on 55 testimonies from former detainees from the Gaza Strip, the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem, and citizens of Israel. The overwhelming majority of these detainees were held without trial.

At least 70 known detainees have died in Israeli prisons since 7 October 2023. Among them are at least 44 detainees from Gaza, the highest number in history, according to the prisoner groups.

Since 1967, a total of 307 Palestinian prisoners have died in Israeli occupation prisons. The groups said the identities of many martyrs among Gaza’s detainees remain undisclosed, as the Israeli occupation continues to conceal them, making this the “bloodiest stage in the history of the prisoner movement.

According to the Palestine Center for Prisoners Studies, more than half of the Palestinian prisoners who have died since October 2023, were killed primarily as a result of torture and abuse.

Due to the sharp rise in arrests—particularly among Gazans—Israel has opened new detention and interrogation centers operated directly by its military. According to the center, these facilities have become sites of “systematic torture and mistreatment, in clear violation of international law and human rights.”

The center also revealed that Israel has officially acknowledged the deaths of 37 detainees in Sde Teiman detention center since October 2023, though this number is likely only a fraction of the true toll.

Many prisoners from Gaza have been subjected to forced disappearance and held incommunicado under inhumane conditions, creating an environment where extrajudicial killings can occur without oversight or accountability.

In addition to torture, the center documented 29 deaths resulting from medical negligence. Israel is reported to routinely deny prisoners access to basic medical care, holding them in unsanitary, disease-ridden conditions and delaying or outright refusing necessary treatment for extended periods. In many cases, prisoners are only transferred to hospitals when they are on the brink of death.