As protesters back troops accused of abuse, a debate erupts on military morality in war
Family members of reservists suspected of torturing a Gazan detainee say soldiers should be thanked, not prosecuted, as area outside Beit Lid becomes latest ideological flashpoint
Cnaan Lidor is The Times of Israel's Jewish World reporter
On a hot afternoon outside the military tribunals of the Beit Lid army base near Netanya, dozens of protesters gathered Tuesday to voice their opposition to the arrest of nine Israeli soldiers accused of torturing a Palestinian prisoner.
As protesters and relatives of suspects gathered outside the Beit Lid military court to hear whether the soldiers would be arraigned, many focused on the professed innocence of the suspects, two of whom were ordered freed Tuesday, and on their alleged mistreatment.
As left-wing activists rallied for the supremacy of the rule of law, the space outside Beit Lid Tuesday quickly became a microcosm of the broader national debate about the moral and ethical obligations of Israel as a democracy that grapples with jihadist terrorism and enemies unbound by Western legal standards.
Tuesday’s protest was relatively calm compared to previous days, when rioting protesters briefly breached the perimeter of Beit Lid and another base at Sde Teiman where the nine were arrested.
Right-wing politicians, including Heritage Minister Amihai Elyahu and Zvi Sukkot of the Religious Zionism party, fueled and participated in those chaotic demonstration Sunday, prompting harsh rebukes from other politicians, including Yair Lapid, who called them “criminal thugs.”
The reservists’ arrests and ensuing riots underscored tensions in Israeli society between nationalistic hawks and doves with a more humanistic worldview. They also highlighted divisions within the right-wing coalition of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party condemned the arrests, calling them “disgraceful.” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and army authorities should “back the combatants” and “end the summer camps and patience for terrorists,” he wrote in a statement.
On Tuesday, Gallant and Ben Gvir both sent Netanyahu letters urging him to review each other’s actions: Gallant claimed Ben Gvir may have ordered police not to intervene at the Sde Teiman riots, and Ben Gvir expressed concerns that Gallant kept troops out of the Gaza border area on October 7. Galant also condemned the role of officials in the rioting and breaking into army bases.
Netanyahu issued a brief statement Monday, condemning attempts to break into IDF bases. President Isaac Herzog, a former Labor party leader, also spoke out against the riots. On Tuesday he added a call for a review of how the suspected reservists were arrested — military police officers wearing balaclavas raided Sde Teiman to put them under arrest, a move many found unnecessary — but asserted the necessity of an investigation.
“The morality of the IDF has always been our pride, internally and vis-à-vis the family of nations and international law. Our morality is tested constantly because many enemies all over the world try to harm us, including through international law: to persecute our officers, troops, and elected officials. So we must act morally and responsibly,” Herzog wrote in a statement.
Several dozen demonstrators belonging to the center-left anti-government protest movement showed up near Beit Lid Tuesday evening with signs supporting the investigation of the soldiers. “The rule of law protects Israeli troops,” one poster read.
To the anti-government protesters, the arrests were a necessary step toward accountability and justice. On the right, those protesting the arrests were incensed anew Tuesday by the latest twist in the legal saga: Military prosecutors had reportedly phoned up Hamas detainees who have been released to the Gaza Strip to inquire whether they had undergone torture.
“So now we’re building a case against these reservists, asking for terrorists to write essentially a Yelp review for how they were treated?! Have we lost all shred of sanity?” demanded Orian Ben Chitrit, a sister of one of the suspected soldiers, at Tuesday’s rally.
The soldiers are suspected of abusing a Palestinian detainee in their custody and causing bodily harm by inserting an object into the prisoner’s rectum. They face charges of aggravated sodomy, abuse under aggravated circumstances and conduct unbecoming of a soldier. Some of the suspects are also suspected of assault and interfering with the work of public servants, according to the Israel Defense Forces.
The detainees are reservists from Unit 100 who were trained specifically in guarding terrorists, according to a lawyer representing one of the troops.
A covert investigation at Sde Teiman, where dozens of suspected Hamas terrorists have been held since the October 7 massacre, led to the arrests. The action drew widespread criticism that it was an excessive measure against reservists who had been serving their country for months at a remote base during wartime.
“Every Israeli who wants to avoid the growing rift in our society should come to Beit Lid to protest these arrests, which are unfounded, but we don’t want any violence or disturbances because that would only further the rift,” Ben Chitrit said at the rally.
Asked whether she thought her brother committed the acts attributed to him, she said: “No way. We’re Jewish. That’s not our way.”
Ephraim Dimri, a litigator representing one of the suspects, whose names have not been widely reported in the media out of safety concerns, told reporters that his client and all other detainees in the affair deny any wrongdoing. He acknowledged that the alleged terrorist had injuries to his rectum.
“We know how the injuries were caused, the truth will come out, but we’re not about to reveal our legal defense here to the media,” Dimri said.
One protester, Hila, whose husband is among the detained, said: “Our husbands, our sons, our brothers are not criminals; they are heroes. They put their lives on the line every day to protect us from terrorism. This is how we repay them? By throwing them in jail based on the words of our enemies?”
The controversy surrounding the arrests of the soldiers is more than just a legal issue; it touches on the core of Israel’s identity and its moral obligations, said Eliyahu Yosian, a former intelligence analyst whose calls to kill “at least 50,000 Gazans” in the days immediately after October 7 drew attention in Israel.
Yosian, who was born in Iran, appeared to have tapped into a popular sentiment in Israel after October 7, which dismissed the perceived niceties of international criminal law in favor of a response that he said was more authentically Middle Eastern.
The legal system, the military system, and the diplomatic system are “wronging those who fight for Israel,” Yosian told The Times of Israel at the protest Tuesday, where demonstrators greeted him enthusiastically and asked to pose with him for pictures.
The Sde Teiman affair shows the challenges of ensuring the concept of “purity of arms,” the moral codes that guide the IDF. But to Yosian, October 7 showed the irrelevance of that concept to the Israeli experience. The prosecution of Israel at the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice, he added, shows the code’s ineffectiveness in thwarting such legal attacks.
“How can you fight in the Middle East with Western European morals?” he demanded. “Look at Belgium, France. For their liberal values, they are losing their homeland,” Yosian said.
Asked if Israelis accept a reality where soldiers are given permission to emulate their enemies’ depravities, including the anal rape of prisoners, Yosian was unequivocal.
“My commitment to Israeli soldiers is far greater than my commitment to Hamas’s rectum.”
