‘His only crime is that he is a Palestinian doctor’
Detained Palestinian doctor Hussam Abu Safiya appearing via video conference for his Israeli Supreme Court hearing in Jerusalem, 10 June 2026
Shatha Yaish reports in +972 on 17 June 2026:
When a photograph of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya appeared on June 10, it was one of the first signs of life his family had received since February 2025.
The former director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, among the most prominent Palestinian doctors detained by Israel during the genocide in Gaza, had been brought before the Israeli Supreme Court for a hearing on his continued imprisonment. In the image, taken during the proceedings, Abu Safiya appeared frail and visibly thinner than before his arrest following the Israeli military’s raid on Kamal Adwan Hospital in late December 2024.
For his family, the image was devastating.
“We all started crying,” his son, Elyas Abu Safiya, told +972 Magazine. “When we saw the latest picture of my father during his trial, it wasn’t just his face we saw — we saw clear signs of torture. “It is so painful to see your father, who dedicated his life to saving lives and treating patients, like this,” he continued. “I don’t know how to describe it. What is he going through away from the cameras? If this is what we saw in public, what is happening there?”
Abu Safiya is one of 14 Palestinian doctors from Gaza currently held by Israel without charge. In April, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) called for their release, saying the doctors had been denied adequate food and medical care and subjected to physical abuse in detention.