Khalid al-Saifi, a Palestinian prisoner from Dheisheh refugee camp near Bethlehem, died in early February 2026 — one week after being released from Israeli detention. He had been held at Ramleh Prison Clinic, the Israeli prison system’s medical facility, where he was held despite suffering from severe pulmonary fibrosis and extreme physical deterioration. He was released when his condition became critical enough that keeping him was no longer viable. He died shortly after.

The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, which monitors detention conditions, described al-Saifi’s case as consistent with what it calls “slow execution” — a pattern in which prisoners are held under conditions that cause irreversible physical damage and then released at the point of death, allowing the prison system to claim it did not kill them. The release arrives too late for treatment. The death occurs outside the prison. The prison system’s record reflects a discharge, not a death in custody.

Al-Saifi’s death came under growing international scrutiny of Israel’s detention system. The Committee to Protect Journalists had just released its annual census ranking Israel as the third-worst jailer of journalists in the world. The CPJ report documented 29 Palestinian journalists behind bars. A separate CPJ special report published in February 2026 documented systematic torture of Palestinian journalists in Israeli detention — electroshock, stress positions, sexual violence, starvation averaging 23.5 kilograms of weight loss per prisoner, and what detainees described as “disco rooms” where loud music was played continuously for days.

More than 9,300 Palestinians are currently in Israeli custody. More than 100 have died in detention since October 2023. The 88 whose identities have been confirmed died under conditions that rights organizations — including Israeli human rights groups — have called systematic torture and medical neglect. The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club notes that the bodies of 96 prisoners who died inside Israeli facilities are still being held by Israeli authorities.

Khalid al-Saifi died at home, one week after release, from damage inflicted inside an Israeli prison. The record will show he was released.