LONDON: US aid officials are attending daily meetings at Israel’s Sde Teiman base, where widespread use of torture and sexual violence is employed against Palestinian prisoners, reports allege.
It follows a decision in July to move Israel’s humanitarian relief hub to the desert base, three USAID officials told The Guardian.
Israel consolidated all of its Gaza aid oversight bodies into the Joint Coordination Board, which operates at Sde Teiman and coordinates with the US, UN and various NGOs.
The US has a regular presence at the site as part of its mission to facilitate urgent humanitarian aid to Gaza.
Sde Teiman was chosen by Israel as a holding facility for Palestinian prisoners in the wake of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack.
But extensive reporting by human rights groups, involving eyewitness accounts, has revealed that thousands of Palestinians who passed through the facility were subjected to severe physical and psychological abuse, torture and sexual violence.
Despite this, two USAID officials continue to visit Sde Teiman daily for meetings with Israeli and UN staff as part of the JCB.
A USAID official told The Guardian: “I can’t sleep at night knowing that it’s going on. It’s another form of psychological torture to make someone work there.”
It is unclear whether USAID staff have witnessed the section of Sde Teiman where Palestinian prisoners are detained, with one report saying the JCB operates out of “a handful of makeshift trailers.”
The reports issued by human rights groups on Sde Teiman cite whistleblowers and former prisoners to allege a consistent pattern of brutality by Israeli soldiers at the site.
The violence against Palestinian prisoners includes rape, beatings, electrocutions and force-feeding.
One Israeli doctor who worked at the facility reported that prisoners were “routinely” amputated due to aggressive handcuffing.
Since Oct. 7, about 4,000 Palestinians have passed through the prison, with at least 35 dying, the New York Times reported in May.
Khaled Mahajneh, a lawyer who visited Sde Teiman, told +972 Magazine: “The situation there is more horrific than anything we’ve heard about Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.”
Israel has claimed that only 24 prisoners remain in the facility, and that a planned new wing would improve conditions.
But Tal Steiner, executive director of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, told The Guardian: “We have no indication that the living conditions in the camp have indeed been improved, as our lawyers have still not had access to the camp to assess that.”
One of the most controversial incidents at Sde Teiman took place earlier this year when a Palestinian prisoner was left in critical condition after being gang-raped by 10 Israeli soldiers, who were later investigated.
The decision to launch an investigation led to violent rioting and attacks by Israeli groups in support of the soldiers.
Israel moved its humanitarian oversight body to Sde Teiman from Hatzor airbase north of Gaza.
Weeks before, USAID chief Samantha Power visited the airbase, saying: “I think what’s happening in this room is incredibly important.”
Yet sources told The Guardian that the relocation has been a “closely guarded secret,” with internal communication listing the new site as nearby Beersheva instead of Sde Teiman.
Power, who previously served as US ambassador to the UN and senior adviser to former President Barack Obama, has faced mounting criticism within USAID over her failure to permit more aid to Gaza by way of agreements with Israel.
In March, 76 staffers sent a letter to a USAID bureau condemning the agency’s “silence on the suffering of Gaza.”
In response to The Guardian, USAID claimed that it is “working closely to ensure more effective dialogue between humanitarian partners and the Israeli government to improve the safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of humanitarian movements into and throughout Gaza. Due to security considerations, we do not comment on the specific locations of our staff.”
