When Israel re-arrested Palestinian men in the occupied West Bank town of Dura, the detainees faced familiar treatment.

They were blindfolded, handcuffed, insulted and kept in inhumane conditions. More unusual was that each man had a number written on his forehead.

Osama Shaheen, who was released in August after 10 months of administrative detention, told Middle East Eye that soldiers brutally stormed his house, smashing his furniture.

“The soldiers turned us from names into numbers, and every detainee had a number that they used to provoke him during his arrest and call him by number instead of name. To them, we are just numbers.”

  • Jumpingspiderman@reddthat.com
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    2 days ago

    It’s not a brand. It’s marker. like they do to runners in some race. With all the other horrid shit Israel does to folks in Gaza, this is pretty small beer and hardly worth the electrons to post it.

    • Hamartia@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      If your local police force rounded up all the males in a minority group and wrote the processing numbers on their foreheads do you think it might make the news?

      • Jumpingspiderman@reddthat.com
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        2 days ago

        If my local police were bombing schools and hospitals, their writing numbers on people with sharpies might just get (rightfully) overlooked.

        • Hamartia@lemmy.world
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          2 days ago

          At the time maybe, but a lot of smaller details such as this will become much more important later on when the dust settles. So, why not write it up now so that ot can be revisited later on. It’s not as if there’s a limit to the number of acticles they can publish.

    • 4lan@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Yeah no one is saying that markers are inhumane, this is clearly a post drawing parallels between Nazi Germany and Nazi Israel

      • Hamartia@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        Writing the number on their foreheads is flat out dehumanising. How is that in any way contentious?