No Answers.No Body

Mu’taz al-Atrash was 21 and from Hebron. The Times of Israel reported on Sept. 17, 2026, that he died early on Tuesday, Sept. 15, at Ofer prison, in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society said he had no known health problems before he was placed in administrative detention on Oct. 5, 2025.

Haaretz’s English page introduces its report with this line: “Moataz al-Atrash, 21, had never been suspected of wrongdoing. Israeli soldiers seized him in the dead of night a year ago and detained him without charge. His family heard nothing from the authorities until last month, when they were told he had died.”

Some outlets spell his name Moataz al-Atrash. Qayd reported his death in Issue 02, in September. This issue picks up the story a month later.

The account comes from the father, Nizam al-Atrash, in a Haaretz report by Gideon Levy and Alex Levac, published in Hebrew on Oct. 23, 2026. On Sept. 16, the day after his son died, the father received a phone call from the Kiryat Arba police. He was sure he was being called in ahead of his son’s release.

The officer checked and came back with the news: his son was dead. The officer said the body would be taken to the Abu Kabir forensic institute, and had the father sign consent to an autopsy. The forms were in Hebrew only, and the father signed documents he could not read.

The officer asked the father to stay reachable, so that he could be told when the family would receive the body after the autopsy. It would take about two days, the officer promised, once the autopsy was done.

On Sept. 17, the Palestinian Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society said an Israeli court had ordered an autopsy, to be carried out in the presence of a representative appointed by the family, The Times of Israel reported.

A month after the death, Haaretz reported on Oct. 23, the body had still not been returned. It had joined the hundreds of bodies that Israel holds, the report said, without giving any explanation. No one had bothered to tell the family what exactly their son died of.

The lawyer who represents the family for the Palestinian Prisoners’ Society explained that the return of the body was being delayed because of the election, Haaretz reported. Amnesty International states that Israel’s parliamentary elections will be held on Oct. 27, 2026.

All three were held in administrative detention, without charge or trial, when they died: Walid Ahmad and Mu’taz al-Atrash according to The Times of Israel, Marwan Harzallah according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Walid Ahmad was 17 and lived in the village of Silwad, in the occupied West Bank. The Times of Israel reported on March 24, 2026, that he was held under administrative detention and “collapsed and was pronounced dead in March of last year.” The report adds: “Even though over a year has passed since his death, Israel still continues to hold on to his body.” We found nothing newer than March 2026 on the body.

Marwan Harzallah worked as a technician at Palestinian Authority-affiliated Palestine TV, the Committee to Protect Journalists says. Israeli forces arrested him on Jan. 8, 2026, at his home in the town of Zawata, near Nablus, and he was held in administrative detention, without being sentenced, according to CPJ. He died in Megiddo prison on March 28, 2026, according to information from Palestinian officials obtained by the family. The Palestinian news site Al-Quds reported on Oct. 8, 2026, that Israeli authorities released his body that day.

Mu’taz al-Atrash’s father was told of his death on Sept. 16. A month later, Haaretz reported, the body had not been returned. We found no report of its return as of Oct. 25.

Arab News reported on Oct. 8, 2026, that after Harzallah’s body was returned, Palestinian prisoners’ organizations said Israel continued to withhold “the bodies of 99 Palestinians who died in custody, including 88 who died since the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023.” The organizations described them as part of a broader total of hundreds of Palestinian bodies held by Israeli authorities.

In Haaretz’s Oct. 23 report, the Israel Prison Service replied that, for reasons of privacy and security, it does not give out information on the identity, status or place of holding of prisoners or detainees, or personal details about any one inmate. Questions about the circumstances described in Haaretz’s inquiry, the Israel Prison Service said, should go to authorized security officials. Haaretz noted that the reply ignored the fact that the detainee had died.

On Sept. 17, 2026, The Times of Israel reported a statement by the Israel Prison Service after the death, citing Haaretz: the Israel Prison Service refused to discuss individual prisoners “out of privacy and security concerns,” but said “all detainees receive the rights and medical attention they deserve in accordance with the law and professional medical opinion.” The statement gave no circumstances of the death.

The Israel Prison Service gave the Committee to Protect Journalists a similar answer about Marwan Harzallah. That reply is set out in this file under “What the Israel Prison Service told CPJ about Marwan Harzallah.”

The Minnesota Protocol on the Investigation of Potentially Unlawful Death was published by the UN Human Rights Office in 2016. It sets out how states should investigate deaths that may be unlawful, including deaths in custody. It is a standard. It is not a finding about the cases in this issue.

Paragraph 17 reads in full: “In any event, the State is under the obligation to provide all relevant documentation to the family of the deceased, including the death certificate, medical report and reports on the investigation held into the circumstances surrounding the death.”

Paragraph 37 reads in full: “Upon completion of the necessary investigative procedures, human remains should be returned to family members, allowing them to dispose of the deceased according to their beliefs.”

HaMoked: Center for the Defence of the Individual describes itself as a human rights organization that assists Palestinians living under the Israeli occupation. It publishes the Israel Prison Service’s monthly figures. For October 2026 it gives 3,101 administrative detainees “held without trial.” The full count is set out in this file under “The whole count, October 2026.”

The Times of Israel describes administrative detention as the procedure that “allows Israeli forces to hold Palestinians in custody for months on end with no charge or trial in cases where the forces suspect intent to commit a security crime but don’t have enough evidence to bring the case to court.” The newspaper used that description when it reported Mu’taz al-Atrash’s death.

That Walid Ahmad and Mu’taz al-Atrash were in administrative detention is reported by The Times of Israel; for Marwan Harzallah, by the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Haaretz reported on Oct. 23 that Ahmad Hmeidat, 28, from the Jalazone refugee camp, died in detention. According to Palestinian media, cited by Haaretz, he was last heard from on Sept. 30. His family received no information about him until they were told of his death.

Amnesty International said on Oct. 21, 2026, that Ayman Bani Owda, a social worker from Tammoun, “has been arbitrarily detained by Israeli forces since 17 November 2025.” Amnesty called on the Israeli authorities to release him “immediately and unconditionally.”

Amnesty also reported a court step: “On 24 September 2026, an Israeli military court upheld the order but reduced the detention period from four months to three.”

The Guardian and Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ) reported on Oct. 22, 2026, that one detainee, Essa, was likely to have been tortured with a Taser electroshock weapon manufactured by the American company Axon Enterprise. “A spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces said the abuse of detainees was strictly prohibited,” the Guardian wrote. What the other three detainees allege is set out in this file under “Electroshock weapons: the other three detainees.”