When Israel re-arrested Palestinian men in the occupied West Bank town of Dura, the detainees faced familiar treatment.
They were blindfolded, handcuffed, insulted and kept in inhumane conditions. More unusual was that each man had a number written on his forehead.
Osama Shaheen, who was released in August after 10 months of administrative detention, told Middle East Eye that soldiers brutally stormed his house, smashing his furniture.
“The soldiers turned us from names into numbers, and every detainee had a number that they used to provoke him during his arrest and call him by number instead of name. To them, we are just numbers.”
TBF it depends on the prison. In this comment I will be referring to jails and prisons within the U.S., and I am working with the same assumptions you made in your comment.
People are put in jail without trial all the time, when awaiting trial. This is extremely common especially with poorer people who can’t afford bail.
Most prisons and many jails give prisoners a number, and will sometimes even refer to them only by the number. It’s not written on their head, but it is often attached to their uniform, and they can sometimes be punished for taking them off. It’s weird to write it on their head, and really just kinda silly if you ask me. They probably don’t have the resources for name tags because they’ve spent 200% of the budget on more bombs it seems.
Some jails and prisons have conditions that equate to actual torture according to the UN. Extreme heat without AC, cruel punishments, inadequate nutrition and safety. Most notable of these is solitary confinement, which is a very common prison punishment, and which is rightly classified as torture by the United Nations. Some people spend months or even years or decades in solitary confinement.
I think we all agree that the IDF is committing acts of genocide and inexcusable violence against civilians and captured combatants, but it’s also important to not inflate the facts, and to focus our attention on greater issues. Does it really matter so much that the IDF writes a number on their forehead, when they’re also bombing children? Is a marker really a greater evil than a bomb?
People can be held in jail before they are charged but they require a charge and a trial.
Here the IDF is picking up people, throwing them in confinement, beating them up and then throwing them out.
Wiithout a trial ever happening. Nor do they plan it to happen. There is no legal system involved.
Comparisons can be made. Guantanamo bay, Uyghur camps, etc. But that is not what most people call a “jail”. This is kangaroo court stuff.
I agree that the kids getting bombed is bigger news. But seeing “Israel bombed 50 kids today” every single day doesn not hit the same after a while. And it is not really “boring” in the way this is.
I’m not disagreeing that It is a terrible thing. What they’re doing is wrong and they should be punished. However we are not so different, and that is the damn truth of the thing. To that end, my comment was merely pointing out that the previous comments argument was very flawed.