UN Rapporteur Francesca Albanese: Israel Institutionalizes Torture as Structural Element of Genocide and Colonial Apartheid Against Palestinians

Original article: Relatora Francesca Albanese: Israel ha institucionalizado la tortura como elemento estructural del genocidio y el apartheid colonial contra el pueblo palestino

The UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, presented a report to the Human Rights Council on Monday, March 23, concluding that Israel has institutionalized torture as a fundamental component of the genocide and colonial apartheid against the Palestinian people.

The document, titled «Torture and Genocide,» discusses how since October 7, 2023, Israel has subjected Palestinians to a systematic regime of torture that includes violence in detention centers and the imposition of a «torturous environment» throughout the occupied territories, characterized by forced displacements, sieges, famine, mass killings, and the destruction of vital infrastructures.

«Torture is not incidental violence. It is the very architecture of settler colonialism, built on the basis of dehumanization and maintained by policies of cruelty and collective torture,» the report states.

Alarming Statistics

According to the report, over 18,500 Palestinians have been arrested since October 2023, including more than 1,500 children.

Of these, at least 9,245 remain in Israeli detention centers, where practices such as beatings, sexual assaults, starvation, forced nudity, denial of medical care, use of dogs, electric shocks, and prolonged isolation have been documented. Additionally, 4,000 detainees are unaccounted for.

Rapporteur Albanese warns that these abuses are coordinated by high-ranking Israeli officials, including the Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who has promoted a «prison revolution» that institutionalized the degradation of Palestinian detainees.

«They released the police dogs again, letting them rip our flesh apart. One dog attacked a fellow detainee and started biting his genitals. He bled to death in my arms. A doctor, protected behind a gate, examined him from a distance and said: ‘Throw him out,'» Albanese read while presenting the report in Geneva, citing one of the testimonies.

Genocide as Collective Torture

Beyond detention centers, the report emphasizes that the living conditions imposed by Israel in Gaza and the West Bank constitute an act of collective torture, where the mass destruction of homes, blockade of humanitarian aid, killing of medical personnel, and campaign of forced displacement, are part of a deliberate strategy to inflict long-term physical and mental suffering.

«When torture is systematically used against a population ‘as such’, it is both a means of domination and a testament to genocidal intent,» affirmed Albanese during the report presentation.

«The testimonies that many others and I are collecting are not merely tragic stories of suffering. They are evidence of horrific crimes directed against the entire Palestinian people throughout the occupied territory, through a series of criminal behaviors. Therefore, I conclude that genocide has become the ultimate form of torture, collective and generational,» emphasized the UN Rapporteur.

Accountability for Those Responsible

Finally, the report urges Israel to «immediately cease all forms of torture and mistreatment, and to allow access for international organizations to detention centers.»

Moreover, it calls on states to «activate mechanisms of universal jurisdiction and the International Criminal Court’s Prosecutor to investigate and issue arrest warrants against high-ranking Israeli officials, including Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich, and Israel Katz, for their alleged responsibility in crimes against humanity and genocide.»

«The way you respond to this abomination will test our collective legal and moral responsibility. International law is unequivocal. Torture is absolutely prohibited in all circumstances, just as genocide is,» reiterated Francesca Albanese, concluding that «every delay exacerbates irreversible harm and reinforces a system of cruelty that international law and the United Nations are designed to prevent, cease, and punish.»

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