Ramallah, May 17 (QNA) - The Palestine Center for Prisoner Studies (PCPS) Center said minors held in Israeli prisons are being subjected to escalating abuse and punitive measures, most notably prolonged solitary confinement under what it described as harsh and inhumane conditions that are causing serious psychological and physical harm.

Director of PCPS Riyad Al Ashqar said minors detained in the juvenile sections of Ofer and Megiddo prisons, as well as dozens held in detention and interrogation centers, are facing retaliatory measures by Israeli occupation prison authorities.

He said the measures include overcrowding in prison cells, denial of family visits, medical neglect, intensified raids and searches, reduced food rations, and the expanded use of solitary confinement.

Al Ashqar noted a sharp increase in the number of minors placed in solitary confinement since Oct. 7, 2023.

He explained that solitary confinement had been rarely used against minors before the war, but the number of recorded cases rose significantly afterward, reaching 290 cases in 2024 and 325 in 2025, with detention periods ranging from several days to months.

Al Ashqar said solitary confinement has become a systematic policy rather than isolated incidents, warning of its severe psychological impact on minors, including anxiety, depression, hallucinations, and memory disorders.

He also pointed to worsening physical conditions caused by food shortages, poor-quality meals, and the spread of disease amid a lack of medical treatment.

According to Al Ashqar, scabies has spread among most detained minors due to the absence of hygiene supplies, restrictions on bathing, and water shortages.

He stressed that the treatment of around 350 Palestinian minors in Israeli occupation prisons constitutes a flagrant violation of international conventions protecting children, which prohibit torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.

Al Ashqar said the continuation of such practices amounts to war crimes, particularly given the detention of children in conditions lacking minimum health and safety standards.

He added that neglect and mistreatment in Israeli occupation prisons have reached the point of causing death by starvation, referring to the death of a minor detainee from the town of Silwad in Megiddo Prison in March 2025. (QNA)