From October 2013 to July 2014, HaMoked sent the Israel Prison Service (IPS) requests for the medical files of Palestinian prisoners who had complained they had suffered ill-treatment and physical abuse during detention. Following lengthy correspondence, HaMoked received materials in 16 cases out of the 18 cases it has handled and had written about. In two of these cases, the medical files arrived incomplete; this, despite the court’s ruling on
HaMoked’s petition, HCJ 4677/10, that it is the IPS’s duty to maintain complete medical records of any person held in its facilities.
Thereupon, in late May 2015, HaMoked sent two separate letters to the State Attorney’s Office about those prisoners whose medical files were delivered with missing documents and information.
In one of its letters, HaMoked demanded to receive the complete medical file of a Palestinian man from Hebron, who was arrested by the military at his home on October 2, 2013. HaMoked asserted that the man had not been afforded the medical treatment he required, despite the fact that he was unwell at the time of his arrest and had told the prison doctor immediately after he was brought to the ISA interrogation facility at Shikma Prison that he was suffering from depression and on regular medication. Moreover, during his detention at Shikma, the man underwent an ordeal of abuse which caused further deterioration of his mental condition.
HaMoked noted that the personal medical file which was delivered to the inmate was incomplete and did not include medical documents from the stage of the arrest by the military – and this, despite the fact that upon his arrest, had the man notified the military physician about his medical problems. HaMoked wrote repeatedly to the IPS chief medical officer to ask that the file be completed, but received no answer. HaMoked also recalled that the IPS had previously undertaken to provide the complete medical records of any prisoner who so requested, an undertaking which prompted HaMoked to delete its petition on the matter; nonetheless, it was recorded in the judgment that HaMoked reserved the right to petition in future individual cases, in the event the IPS failed to fulfil its undertaking.
On June 22, 2015, the IPS announced that following examination of the materials relating to the two prisoners about whom HaMoked had made inquiries, “unfortunately, no medical records preceding their arrival at the IPS’s holding facilities has, been found”.
The absence of medical information concerning Palestinians, whose affidavits indicate that they suffered physical abuse both during arrest and while they were held at the IPS facilities, raises grave concern as to the level of seriousness the IPS views the rules applying to it.
