The State Department condemned images of stripped and blindfolded Palestinian prisoners as "deeply disturbing."

In recent days, images emerged of large crowds of Palestinian males who had been stripped to their underwear and blindfolded. Critics decried the images as dehumanizing and abusive, but Israel defended them as a necessary practice to ensure Hamas prisoners were not concealing suicide vests or weapons. Speaking at a press conference Monday, an official from the State Department agreed with critics that the images were disturbing and warranted further investigation.

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"We found those images deeply disturbing and we are seeking more information, both about the nature of the images and, of course, why they're public in the first place," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller responded when asked if he found such images appropriate.

The reporter asking the question also brought up the allegation from critics that the men in the pictures are not all Hamas fighters — that many are civilians. Miller did not respond to that specific allegation, nor whether the United States had received a response from Israel.

Israeli government spokesman Eylon Levy told CNN on Friday that the Israel Defense Forces were detaining all military-aged males who were found in areas ordered to evacuate in order to ensure none were Hamas members.

“The people we’re seeing in these images are all suspected terrorists,” Levy said. “We wish that all Hamas fighters were wearing uniforms that clearly said Hamas on their helmets because that would make them easier to identify them. But when Hamas [members] dress up as civilians and fight within civilian areas, they make it very difficult to find them.”

A Sunday statement to the Agence France-Presse from the IDF said that everyone found not participating in terrorist activity was released.

“It is often necessary for terror suspects to hand over their clothes such that their clothes can be searched and to ensure that they are not concealing explosive vests or other weaponry,” it added.

One Israeli official expressed confusion as to who released the images, telling the Times of Israel that the release of the images “serve nobody.”

National security adviser Tzachi Hanegbi told Israel's Kan broadcaster on Sunday, “I think you won’t see more pictures like this from now on.”

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The Geneva Convention prohibits the exposure of prisoners of war to “public curiosity,” but many countries hold that terrorists are exempt from that rule. Israel holds that Hamas is a terrorist organization.

Al Jazeera interviewed a group of former detainees, including several children and elderly people, who alleged that they were separated from the women, ordered to strip, and then beaten and imprisoned by the IDF. One of the older members of the group claimed that prisoners were subjected to mock executions.