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Israeli war against Gaza live: Israeli forces attack Gaza City and Rafah | News on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

When former Guantanamo prisoner Asadullah Haroon looks at pictures of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons, memories of his own abuse and torture in US detention centers come flooding back.

“This is the worst form of oppression,” he says. “When you are labelled a terrorist, you cannot defend yourself in any way. Undoubtedly, it is the same process; they torture people in the same way. I think the Americans did it and the Israelis are implementing it.”

Haroon, who won his case against the US government for illegal detention in 2021, was held without charge for 16 years in Cuba’s notorious Guantanamo Bay prison after his arrest in 2007. Without a doubt, he says, Palestinians held in Israeli prisons today suffer similar treatment to him.

“In the first few days after my arrest, I was beaten so badly that I could no longer stand. I could not sit down, and when I was sitting and being beaten, I could not get up. I also suffered from insomnia and was mistreated for several days. Many prisoners were bitten by dogs. We received little medical care.

“The physical torture was really bad, but the worst was the psychological torture in various forms. I think there is not much difference between the torture of prisoners in Palestine, Guantanamo, Bagram and Abu Ghraib.”

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