The youth’s death is the second in weeks at the notorious Megiddo prison where cases of abuse and torture have been reported.
A 17-year-old Palestinian teenager from the occupied West Bank town of Silwad has died in Israel’s Megiddo prison, raising the death toll of Palestinian detainees to 63 since October 2023, prisoner affairs groups have confirmed.
In a joint statement, the Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society (PPS) said Walid Khaled Abdullah Ahmad was detained on September 30, 2024, and held without trial until his death.
“The circumstances of his martyrdom have not yet been confirmed,” the statement noted.
Palestinian Prisoners’ Affairs Commission and Prisoners’ Club confirm the death of 17-year-old detainee Walid Ahmed under mysterious circumstances in Israel’s Megiddo Prison.
Ahmed, from Silwad, was detained in September 2023. His death marks the 63rd Palestinian prisoner to… pic.twitter.com/2Y6ZdimS7h
— The Palestine Chronicle (@PalestineChron) March 24, 2025
It stressed that his death “adds to the list of martyrs who have perished as a result of the systematic crimes carried out by the prison system at an unprecedented scale since the launch of the genocide on October 7, 2023.”
“The war on prisoners has become another facet of this extermination,” the statement added.
‘Bloodiest Phase’
The youth “is the 63rd martyr known by name since the start of the genocide, including at least 40 from Gaza,” the organizations stated, adding that “This marks the bloodiest phase in the history of the prisoners’ movement since 1967.”
In February, another Palestinian held under administrative detention also died in the Megiddo prison.
Khaled Abdullah, 40, from the Jenin refugee camp had been held without charge or trial since November 9, 2023.
The latest death also raised the total number of those to have died in detention since 1967 to 300, “while dozens of detainees from Gaza remain forcibly disappeared.”
Look how Israel treats Palestinians in Megiddo prison. No different from a Nazi camp. This is torture and abuse. pic.twitter.com/QASsIm8e1H
— Richard Medhurst (@richimedhurst) September 6, 2024
In addition, the number of prisoners whose bodies are withheld by the Israeli occupation forces has risen to 72, including 61 since the war began, the organizations noted.
There have been numerous reports of abuse and torture of Palestinian detainees at the hands of Israeli forces, including at the Megiddo prison in northern Israel.
Violence, Abuse at Megiddo
In December, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz cited detainees as having reported several cases of abuse such as “guards kicking, punching, hitting their testicles, and humiliating prisoners.”
Some testified that “a prisoner who was beaten died of his injuries,” the paper reported.
The report confirmed that two prisoners died in Megiddo prison last year, naming them as Omar Daraghmeh, 58, who died on October 23, and Abdul Rahman Mar’i, 33, who died on November 13.
An autopsy revealed that Mar’i had “injuries on his chest, and that his ribs and sternum were broken.”
(The Palestine Chronicle)
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