National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir posted a video showing Palestinian female inmates at Damon prison in northern Israel describing their conditions, their faces blurred, complaining of no access to water for bathing, inadequate medical care, frequent cell raids, and three days without a shower or a change of underwear. One of the women identified in reporting on the video is Yasmine Shaaban, a Palestinian Islamic Jihad member rearrested in May 2025.
Ben Gvir framed the complaints as evidence of success rather than a problem to fix. He said our hostages had no shampoo and had no such conditions, and that he is proud we have succeeded in reducing the terrorists prison conditions to the bare minimum, adding that the days of summer camp in prisons in Israel are over.
The comparison to Israeli hostages, who spent two years in Hamas captivity in Gaza after 7 October 2023, is the argument Ben Gvir is making for a domestic audience mid campaign. It does not address the reports that have documented prisoner treatment under his oversight independently of the hostages' ordeal, which is a separate set of facts the video does not engage with.
The Palestinian Authority and Palestinian groups accused Ben Gvir of brutality, hatred and racism. He posted the video anyway, on the same logic that runs through his other campaign messaging: a policy that draws condemnation from that direction is, to his voters, evidence the policy is working.