UN Committee Against Torture finds 'de facto state policy' of systematic and widespread torture by Israel against Palestinian prisoners.
(December 2, 2025 — Washington, D.C.) The U.S. government should sanction Israeli prison officials responsible for widespread and systematic torture of Palestinians in custody, as detailed in a new report by the United Nations Committee Against Torture. The report, adopted on November 28, 2025, found indications of "a de facto State policy of organized and widespread torture and ill-treatment" of Palestinians in Israeli custody.
On June 25, 2025, DAWN sent a detailed dossier to the State Department, as well as to France, the United Kingdom, Norway, and Australia, urging them to sanction four Israeli prison officials for their role in the systematic torture of Palestinian prisoners.
"There is zero justification, zero excuse for Israel's grotesque torture, rape and starvation of Palestinian prisoners held securely in Israeli custody," said Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man, director for Israel-Palestine at DAWN. "Following damning reports by Palestinian and Israeli rights groups, the latest UN report detailing the brutal torture of Palestinian prisoners should push governments around the world to at the very least sanction the responsible Israeli prison officials."
The UN Committee against Torture (CAT) is a body of 10 independent experts that monitors implementation of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment by its states parties. In its conclusions, published and adopted on November 28, 2025, the committee found, inter alia, that Israel has systematically tortured Palestinian prisoners, used practices amounting to enforced disappearance, denied prisoners adequate food and nutrition and medical care, imposed widespread policies of humiliation and degradation, and carried out routine sexual violence, including rape. The CAT further noted that it is not aware of any prosecutions for these abuses and questioned the competency of Israeli authorities to investigate and prosecute acts of torture.
These findings corroborate the evidence gathered by DAWN in its June 2025 reports and submissions to the U.S. government, which detailed the roles of Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel Prison Service (IPS) Commissioner Kobi Yaakobi, Ofer Prison commander Vadim Goldstein, and Ketziot (Negev) Prison commander Yosef Knipes in the widespread and systematic torture of Palestinians. DAWN's submissions documented dozens of instances of institutionalized abuses of Palestinian prisoners held in Israel, including but not limited to systematic and widespread acts of severe and arbitrary violence, sexual assault, humiliation and degradation, deliberate starvation, forced unhygienic conditions, sleep deprivation, and enforced disappearances under the direction and supervision of the four named officials between October 2023 and December 2024.
"Despite Israel's ratification of the Convention against Torture, it has never formally outlawed torture as a specific crime in its own domestic laws, as required by the convention," said Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of DAWN. "The lack of a law criminalizing torture in Israel should serve as an added impetus for third-states to use alternative legal avenues to hold the torturers accountable."
The international community has previously sanctioned officials from other countries responsible for gross abuses against prison detainees identical or similar to the abuses committed by Israeli officials. The U.S. government has, in at least two dozen cases, sanctioned individuals and entities responsible for the abuse, torture, or inhumane treatment of prisoners and detainees. In those decisions the U.S. repeatedly affirmed that such conduct—including physical abuse, medical neglect, denial of due process, and extrajudicial killings in custody—meets the threshold of serious human rights abuses under E.O. 13818.
The U.S. has used these sanctions against officials responsible for prison and detention abuses in China, Cuba, Iran, South Sudan, Uganda, and Yemen. Other countries have taken similar actions. In 2017, Canada issued sanctions against Venezuelan prison officials. In 2021, 2022 and 2024, the EU, Australia and the UK issued sanctions against Russian prison officials for similar abuses, respectively.
