A/HRC/12/48 page 242 1155. On arrival at Negev, they were severely beaten by the prison security for approximately one and a half hours before being put into cells and told that they were caught during battle and were illegal combatants. Later that night, 10 more people joined the group of detainees. 1156. AD/03 described how on the second day of their incarceration, 20 January, the detainees (at this point 18 in number) were told that they would be interrogated in accordance with their alleged political affiliations. Several of them pointed out that they had none. They were grouped apart. AD/03 said that they talked among themselves and he found out that nine of them were livestock farmers and three or four were merchants and traders. 1157. AD/03 described how the detainees were divided into two groups of nine each and put in a section of the prison referred to as the mardaban, which was divided into two wards containing 10 iron beds each and guarded by Israeli Arab soldiers. They remained incarcerated for eight days, until 27 January, with limited access to food, water, toilets and physical exercise. 1158. On 24 January, AD/03 was given access to a lawyer, affiliated with Addameer, Prisoners Support and Human Rights Association,560 for the first and only time. The Mission interviewed him561 and he confirmed that he had visited AD/03 and his brother on 25 January 2009. The lawyer’s evidence provided corroboration of the detention of AD/03 and his brother (who was also assisted by the lawyer), and the conditions under which he was subjected to criminal proceedings in Israel. The lawyer was informed by the Israeli authorities that AD/03 was detained under the illegal combatant law but he was not given the dossier to review. His brother was never formally charged. 1159. On 25 January, the detainees were told that they would be taken to Beersheba for their trial. On 26 January, all 18 detainees were shackled with iron chains to iron benches in a bus, handcuffed with iron handcuffs and taken to Beersheba. They were not blindfolded. The journey lasted five hours during which the bus drove on bumpy roads causing the detainees to slam against the sides of the bus. They were detained in Beersheba overnight in overcrowded cells together with people convicted of serious offences, according to AD/03. They were mostly Israeli Jews. 1160. The following morning, on 27 January, they were taken back to the Negev prison in shackles and handcuffs. They were given no information regarding the scheduled hearing. The outcome of the proceedings was not clear to AD/03 at the time, as he believed he had been “acquitted” only when they were returned to the Negev prison. 1161. The lawyer from Addameer was present in the court. According to him, the prosecutor made the decision not to proceed with the case rather than the detainees being acquitted. The lawyer confirms that they were held in Ktziot prison in the Negev Desert and released on 27 January. The Mission has heard directly from AD/03’s legal representative, who stated that he received a copy of his file, but not the secret file, from the Prosecutor’s Office on 21 January 2009. AD/03 was arrested on suspicion of being an illegal combatant. 560 561 The lawyer had been alerted to the cases by Al Mezan, a human rights organization in Gaza.