On March 18, 2024, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched a new offensive on Gaza City’s Al-Shifa hospital complex, arresting scores of Palestinians. Mahmoud Elewa, a freelance correspondent for Qatari-funded Al Jazeera TV, was among those held, according to multiple news reports. Other journalists were also arrested in the raid. Elewa was released by the Israeli authorities on February 27, 2025.
Elewa was among the first to report on the hospital raid and the arrest of Al Jazeera reporter Ismail Al Ghoul on March 18. Al Ghoul was released after about 12 hours in Israeli custody. The Al Jazeera reporter was killed on July 31, 2024.
Elewa’s mother, Rida Al-Sharqawi, told CPJ via messaging app on September 5, 2024 that she did not know her son’s whereabouts until the daughter of a prisoner who was released in mid-July told her that Elewa was in Ofer Prison in the West Bank. He was in good health but had not seen a lawyer, Al-Sharqawi said.
The Palestinian prisoner support group Addameer told CPJ that Israeli authorities denied their request to visit Elewa at Ofer Prison on October 21, 2024. CPJ could not determine whether the journalist was facing any charges.
Elewa told CPJ after his release that, while in detention, he was subjected to systematic, daily torture, including severe sleep deprivation and being forced to sit, motionless, for hours, without changing position and with only one- to two-minute breaks to go to the restroom.
"The forms of torture inflicted upon us were both physical and psychological,” Elewa said. “They included arbitrary abuse — often dependent on the individual jailer's mood — which could occur anywhere from once a week to every single day, in addition to verbal insults and beatings. In the interrogation wing, they would first place us in a large metal cell then transfer us to a room where we were subjected to [stress positions] and physical abuse. Afterward, we would be moved to what they called the 'Disco Room,' where loud music was blasted continuously to prevent us from sleeping.”
He recalled appearing before a court twice — the first time two months after his arrest and the second several months later — and referred to his trials as a “sham” process that was based on secret information. Elewa did not meet with a lawyer until eight months into his detention.
Elewa lost approximately 38 kilograms (84 pounds) during his detention — a direct result of the Israeli policy of deliberate starvation implemented within its prisons and detention centers.
Prior to his release, Elewa told CPJ that he was “explicitly threatened not to return to journalism. I was told that if I did, I would be targeted by drones. The objective is clear: to silence voices."
Alaa Skafi, director of Addameer, told CPJ that journalists from Gaza are generally held under the Incarceration of Unlawful Combatants Law. According to Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, the law allows Israel to hold detainees for long periods of time without charge and with limited access to legal counsel. Skafi and B’Tselem both described overcrowding, unsanitary conditions, and abuse at Israeli prison facilities housing Palestinian journalists.
Israel’s military operations in Gaza and Lebanon, which began after the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, have devastated the local press. Israel has killed scores of journalists in Gaza as well as six in Lebanon, jailed dozens of Palestinian journalists from Gaza and the West Bank, and destroyed much of the press infrastructure in Gaza, all while preventing the foreign press from entering Gaza.
Elewa was among the journalists whose testimony was included in the CPJ special report “We returned from hell,” published in February 2026, which compiles accounts from 58 journalists who reported patterns of abuse, torture, and mistreatment against Palestinian journalists inside Israeli prisons.
The Israeli military did not respond to CPJ’s repeated requests for comment on specific allegations by journalists in the report, instead requesting ID numbers and geographic coordinates that CPJ does not collect or provide. When asked about allegations of physical and sexual abuse, starvation, and the investigation and accountability process, an army spokesperson said “individuals detained are treated in accordance with international law,” adding that the armed forces “have never, and will never, deliberately target journalists,” and that any violations of protocol “will be looked into.”
CPJ also emailed the Israel Prison Service (IPS) regarding the allegations in the report. In response, the IPS said “all prisoners are detained according to the law” and that “all basic rights are fully upheld by professionally trained prison guards.” The service said it was unaware of the claims described, and that to its knowledge “no such events have occurred,” but noted that “prisoners and detainees have the right to file a complaint that will be fully examined and addressed by official authorities.”
CPJ previously emailed the IDF, Israel’s Security Agency, also known as Shin Bet, and the IPS in late 2024 for comment on the cases of imprisoned Palestinian journalists but received no response.