My parents woke me up at around 3:30 a.m. and told me Israeli soldiers were in our house. The soldiers did not wait for my father to open our front door; they just broke it and stormed in. Many soldiers came in to our house. They searched our house and broke our furniture. They broke beds, wardrobes and glass, they turned the house into a mess. They said they were looking for my mobile phone. 

 

After searching our house one of the soldiers told my father they were going to arrest me. My father told him I had a serious injury in my leg, but the soldier did not pay attention to what my father said. The soldiers swore at me and at my parents. Then the soldiers took me outside where a soldier tied my hands behind my back with four plastic ties, two on each wrist and he connected the two pairs of ties together in a chain. The ties were very tight and painful. They left marks on my wrists. When the interrogator cut them off with a pen knife he cut my hands too.

 

The soldiers took me on foot to the police station in Etzion settlement and on the way a soldier blindfolded me. Then I was taken to the back of a jeep where I sat on a seat and the jeep took me to Ofer prison, near Jerusalem. On the way the soldiers beat me all over my body, especially on the upper part of my body. They also swore at me calling me “a son of a whore”. I arrived at Ofer at around noon. They removed the blindfold and shackled me. I was taken to a waiting area and in the afternoon, I was taken for interrogation.

 

The interrogator was in civilian clothes not in uniform. He had a voice recorder on his desk. He allowed me to call my father. I told my father to appoint me a lawyer. The interrogator did not allow me to speak to a lawyer and did not inform me of my right to silence. He told me there were confessions against me by other young men from my village. 

 

At first the interrogator was calm but then he became aggressive. He thumped the table when I refused to confess to his accusations. He questioned me for about three hours and then he asked me to sign documents written in Hebrew but I refused to sign. Then they took my fingerprints and then I was strip searched before being taken to section 13.

 

Seven days later I was taken to Al Mascobiyeh interrogation centre in West Jerusalem for further interrogation. The interrogator was in civilian clothes. He did not allow me to speak to a lawyer and did not inform me of my right to silence. He accused me of weapons possession and wanted to accompany me to my home so I could hand him over the weapons. I denied the accusation. He questioned me on and off throughout the day but did not ask me to sign any documents. 

 

At the end of the day I was taken to a small cell where I spent 37 days in solitary confinement. There were no windows in the cell which was the size of a small bathroom. There was a metal bed and hardly any space left for me to move around. Also inside the cell was an open sewer which smelled. The guards left the light on 24 hours. In order to sleep, I covered the light bulb with my shirt. To make it worse, the light was on dimmer and sometimes it was very bright. I did not know day from night. I sometimes called the guard to ask for the time. He would tell me it was 7:00 and then, hours later, I would ask again and he would say it was 7:10. He did not want me to know the real time. I was constantly exhausted and sometimes I fell asleep during the interrogation. The first few days it was very hard for me, but then I adjusted because I had no choice. 

 

During the 37 days, I was questioned multiple times on a daily basis. I never spoke to a lawyer and I was not informed of my right to silence. I was accused of all sorts of things including weapons possession. The interrogator did not show me any evidence except confessions by other men and I continued to deny the accusations. At the end the interrogator went to our house and searched it again and then he decided to end the interrogation.

 

After 37 days I was transferred to Megiddo prison, inside Israel, where I was strip searched before being taken to section 3. 

 

My first military court hearing was on the third day following my arrest. My father was in court and my detention was extended. I had about 20 hearings in all. At the last one, which was about two months before I was released, I was sentenced in a plea bargain to six months in prison and fined NIS 2,000. I also received another five months in prison suspended for five years. My lawyer encouraged me to accept the bargain and I did. 

 

I spent the rest of my time at Megiddo. My family visited me twice and I was allowed to call home twice a month from a phone provided by the prison authorities. Sometimes the intervals were longer. 

 

I was released on 1 October 2023, a week before the October 7 events. I was released at Salem checkpoint and my brother and cousin picked me up and took me home. I arrived home at around 8:00 p.m. I left school in ninth grade; I did not find school useful. About a quarter of the boys in my class drop out of school early. I work at a bakery, cooking meals on wood fire. There are no jobs around and I constantly worry about collaborators in my village, there are lots of them.