Israeli Medics Face ICC Complaint Over Torture of Gaza Detainees

Hind Rajab Foundation seeks an investigation into medical complicity at Sde Teiman as the World Medical Association meets in Rotterdam

greatreporter8 October 2026, 18:28 UTC 6 min read

Gaza prisoners in Israel — Sde Teiman Prison

The Hind Rajab Foundation has asked the International Criminal Court to investigate Israeli officials, doctors and medical leaders over allegations that healthcare at the Sde Teiman detention camp became an integral part of the torture and abuse of Palestinians taken from Gaza.

Announced on 8 October, the submission alleges a chain of responsibility stretching from government ministries to clinicians and the Israeli Medical Association. It describes detainees losing limbs after prolonged shackling, undergoing surgery without adequate pain relief and receiving treatment while bound and blindfolded.

The foundation timed its action to coincide with the World Medical Association’s general assembly in Rotterdam, running from 7 to 10 October. Among the people it identifies are former health ministers Moshe Arbel and Uriel Buso, IMA president Zion Hagay, chief executive Leah Wapner and ethics board chair Yosef Walfisch.

The filing is an Article 15 communication asking the ICC prosecutor to investigate alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity and acts of genocide. It is not an indictment or a finding of guilt. The ICC prosecutes individuals, so any criminal proceedings arising from allegations about the IMA would concern the responsibility of particular people rather than the association as a corporate defendant.

At the centre of the complaint is the relationship between medical treatment and the detention regime at Sde Teiman, a military base in southern Israel used to hold thousands of Palestinians after October 2023.

HRF says the Health Ministry established a medical facility inside the complex shortly after the war began. Although it remained under the ministry’s auspices, medical workers, including civilian doctors serving as reservists and volunteers, were placed under Military Police authority rather than the military’s Medical Corps.

The foundation points to a Health Ministry directive dated 19 December 2023 which, it says, required treatment of handcuffed and blindfolded detainees, restricted transfers to civilian hospitals to life-threatening conditions or the risk of irreversible disability, and allowed forced treatment without adequate safeguards.

It also says staff were instructed to sign medical records using professional titles rather than their names, obstructing efforts to identify those responsible for particular treatment decisions. HRF argues that these arrangements made medical practice part of the machinery of abuse.

“The evidence shows that medical participation in torture and abuse at Sde Teiman was structural,” said Natacha Bracq, the foundation’s head of litigation.

“The medical system kept detainees alive to endure further torture and interrogation while ensuring their injuries could not be traced through clinical records.”

The allegations build on warnings made by Israeli physicians and international investigators more than two years earlier. In April 2024, Physicians for Human Rights Israel called for Sde Teiman’s closure, arguing that the ministry’s treatment guidelines enabled medical participation in inhumane treatment or torture. It called for detainees needing care to be transferred to civilian facilities operating to proper professional and ethical standards.

A UN commission of inquiry subsequently recorded reports that constant handcuffing and inadequate care had led to amputations. Its September 2024 report said statements by some medical personnel suggested complicity in unlawful practices. More broadly, the commission concluded that Palestinian detainees’ mistreatment reflected an intentional policy and that acts inflicted to cause pain and suffering amounted to torture as a war crime and crime against humanity.

The death toll provides another measure of the camp’s record. Research published by Physicians for Human Rights Israel in November 2025 documented 29 deaths at Sde Teiman within a wider total of at least 94 Palestinians who died in Israeli military and prison custody between 7 October 2023 and 31 August 2025. The organisation warned that incomplete disclosure meant the true total was likely higher. Those figures describe that reporting period; they are not a current comprehensive count.

The dispute also centres on what the medical profession’s leadership knew and how it responded.

In a letter published in The American Journal of Bioethics on 24 April 2024, Hagay, Walfisch and IMA law and policy official Malke Borow defended the care provided at Sde Teiman. Referring to Walfisch’s visit, they said detainees were “receiving appropriate medical care within the necessary precautions taken to ensure the safety of the medical staff”.

The authors acknowledged that individual ethical violations probably occurred, but maintained that, to their knowledge, physicians continued to fulfil their ethical responsibilities.

The IMA has also publicly reaffirmed that doctors must treat patients impartially and that medical ethics prohibit participation in or acceptance of torture, regardless of a detainee’s alleged offence. HRF’s contention is that these general statements were inadequate: it accuses the leadership of providing institutional protection for abuse and failing to initiate disciplinary proceedings against implicated members.

More recent evidence has widened the concern beyond the camp itself. A Physicians for Human Rights Israel paper published on 30 July 2026 examined treatment in public hospitals between October 2023 and September 2025. It described refusals of care, treatment below professional standards, prolonged restraint and blindfolding, premature discharge and patients being returned to detention where they risked further harm. It identified responsibilities extending to hospital managers, the Health Ministry and professional associations.

For the WMA, the complaint raises questions about enforcement of standards it already sets. Its Declaration of Tokyo prohibits doctors from participating in or facilitating torture and requires clinical independence. It also places an ethical obligation on physicians to report abuse. Those duties apply during armed conflict and regardless of what a patient is suspected or accused of doing.

The professional connections are direct. The WMA’s own leadership list identifies Hagay as chair of its Socio-Medical Affairs Committee. HRF says it has sent its communication to the WMA and national medical associations as well as the ICC prosecutor.

The world body has previously called for action. A resolution adopted at its October 2025 assembly urged Israel to halt attacks on healthcare, release arbitrarily detained medical personnel, allow independent investigators access and ensure accountability for crimes. It also called on member associations to condemn attacks on medical workers and facilities.

Pressure on the Rotterdam meeting extends to the continued imprisonment of Palestinian clinicians. In a statement published on 6 October, Médecins Sans Frontières international president Dr Javid Abdelmoneim said more than 80 healthcare workers remained in Israeli custody, including at least 14 doctors from Gaza held without charge.

He called for the release of detained colleagues, including Hussam Abu Safiya, Mazen al-Rantisi and MSF surgeon Mohammed Obeid, alongside independent access to detainees and investigations into attacks on healthcare.

“Patients lose the people they rely on to keep them alive,” he said.

HRF now intends to pursue a further route through national courts. It says it is preparing files on Israeli medical professionals with dual nationality for submission to prosecutors in the countries where they hold citizenship.

Whether its ICC submission produces prosecutions will depend on the evidence, the applicable jurisdiction and the legal requirements for individual criminal responsibility. The immediate demand reaches beyond The Hague: that medical institutions investigate those accused of enabling abuse, disclose their findings and account for what happened to patients placed in their care.

Sources