Sami al-Sai, a freelance reporter for the Qatari broadcaster Al Jazeera Mubasher and the local broadcaster Al-Fajer TV, was held in administrative detention in Ramon prison in southern Israel, according to the Palestinian Commission of Detainee Affairs and a copy of the administrative detention order, which CPJ has reviewed.
On February 23, 2024, Israeli troops arrested Al-Sai at his home in Tulkarem’s Artah neighborhood, according to news reports, the Palestinian press freedom organization MADA, and a video of his arrest posted by Al Jazeera. Twenty Israeli soldiers raided and vandalized his home, handcuffed Al-Sai and his brother, Osama, with plastic ties and took the journalist to an unknown destination without informing him of the reason for his arrest.
Al-Sai was held in administrative detention, which his wife Amani Al-Sai told CPJ was renewed several times. Under administrative detention procedures, authorities may hold detainees for six months without charge if they suspect the detainee of planning to commit a future offense, and then extend the detention an unlimited number of times, according to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem. Judges may accept evidence against the detainee without disclosing it on security grounds.
The administrative detention order said the prosecutor accused Al-Sai of being “a member of Hamas and acting to undermine the security of the state and the judge agreed that these reasons were enough to keep him in detention.” During his detention, the defense lawyer demanded that Al-Sai be released for medical reasons, because he donated a kidney to his son and needs medication, but the judge overruled this objection and said that the doctor at the jail deemed Al-Sai healthy enough to remain in prison.
Prior to his arrest, Al-Sai had been covering Israeli military operations in the city of Tulkarem, particularly in the Nour Shams refugee camp, for the Jordanian broadcaster Al-Haqeqa al-Dawliya, the Tulkarem-based broadcaster Fajer TV, the radio station Shabab FM, and Al Jazeera Mubasher.
Al-Sai is also the founder and director of the news website Karmul, which provides news about the city of Tulkarem. Al-Sai extensively covered the destruction caused by Israeli military operations in the Nour Shams refugee camp.
On June 10, 2025, Israeli authorities released Al-Sai after 16 months of administrative detention. In an interview with CPJ in December 2025, he said that he lost 27 kilograms (59 pounds) as a result of what he called deliberate starvation policies in Israeli prisons. He also reported being threatened with rearrest if he was to reach out to media outlets and talk about the conditions of his imprisonment.
During a public event organized by the Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA) and Filastiniyat held in December 2025, and in an Al-Jazeera interview, A-Sai alleged that while held in Megiddo Prison, Israeli prison guards beat, blindfolded, shackled, humiliated, sexually assaulted and raped him using a baton. Al-Sai described experiencing extreme physical pain and repeated assaults on sensitive areas of his body, including the site of a kidney donation surgery he had undergone before his arrest. He also reported death threats directed at him and other journalists, alongside systematic medical neglect despite his serious health condition.
CPJ spoke to al-Sai again in January 2026, and he detailed the alleged rape by several prison guards.
“On the twentieth day of my detention, I was transferred to Megiddo Prison,” al-Sai told CPJ, “there, on my very first day, I was subjected to sexual assault”
Al-Sai described that soldiers “took me to a narrow place—a cell. While my hands and feet were shackled and I was blindfolded, they threw me onto the ground after removing my pants and underwear. They began to assault me by penetrating me with sticks and solid objects, then a carrot, amid laughter and mockery. They grabbed my penis and testicles and pulled them very violently. I suffered intense pain and severe distress.”
Al-Sai said between four and six prison guards participated in the assault, one of whom spoke Arabic, and that there was also a guard among them. He added that he heard one telling the others not to film in Hebrew. “which suggests they were recording what they were doing to me,” he said.
“After that incident, I was transferred to a section with prisoners, Section 10 in Megiddo Prison. I went into the bathroom to shower and saw blood coming from the rectal area. I tried to treat myself due to the lack of medical care in the prison. I used tissues to stop the bleeding, and this continued for about twenty days. I did not speak to anyone about this inside the prison except for two senior detainees who have been imprisoned for 25 years.”
Al-Sai’s testimony was included in CPJ’s 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, instead requesting ID numbers and geographic coordinates that CPJ does not collect or provide. When asked about allegations of physical, sexual abuse and 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 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 the “prisoners and detainees have the right to file a complaint that will be fully examined and addressed by official authorities.”