IDF reservist gets 7 months behind bars for abuse of Palestinian detainees

An IDF reservist who served as a guard at the Sde Teiman detention facility during the war in Gaza was sentenced on Thursday to seven months in jail for abusing Palestinian detainees, as part of a plea deal.

The army said the reservist, Staff Sgt. (res.) Yisrael Zakaria Hajbi, was convicted by a military court of beating detainees with his fists and weapons on several occasions while they were blindfolded and handcuffed.

“These acts were committed in the presence of other soldiers, some of whom called on him to stop, and were even recorded on the defendant’s cellphone,” the IDF said.

The military said Hajbi admitted to the acts in a plea deal and was sentenced to seven months in jail, along with a suspended sentence.

He will also be demoted to the rank of private, the lowest rank in the IDF.

“The military court determined that the defendant’s actions were grave, and that IDF soldiers have a duty to use the force entrusted to them in accordance with IDF values and orders, at all times and in times of war in particular,” the military added.

ישראל חג'בי, לוחם המילואים מאופקים, שהואשם לפני שלושה חודשים, כי נהג באלימות כלפי מחבלי הנוחב'א מדבר לראשונה על היחס שחווה במעצר, על האמון שנסדק עם המדינה ועל האפשרות לשוב חזרה למילואים.
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— dvir yadai – דביר ידעי (@dvir_yadai) October 15, 2024

Amid an influx in Palestinian detainees as the war in Gaza proceeded, the military opened a detention facility at a base located in Sde Teiman in southern Israel, where it held Gazans suspected of terror activities. Various reports have alleged widespread misconduct and abuse at the site, including extreme use of physical restraints, beatings, neglect of medical problems, arbitrary punishments and more.

This led the army to launch a number of investigations related to incidents at the facility.

Hajbi was indicted in July 2024 for using “severe violence against the detainees he was entrusted with guarding” on several occasions between February and June, while securing the transport of terror suspects.

News of his indictment came after Military Police arrived at Sde Teiman seeking to detain 10 soldiers in connection to an unrelated incident of suspected “serious abuse of a detainee.” Those arrests sparked angry riots that included far-right politicians and other activists storming several IDF facilities demanding the soldiers be released.

ישראל חג'בי, לוחם המילואים מאופקים, שהואשם לפני שלושה חודשים, כי נהג באלימות כלפי מחבלי הנוחב'א מדבר לראשונה על היחס שחווה במעצר, על האמון שנסדק עם המדינה ועל האפשרות לשוב חזרה למילואים.
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— dvir yadai – דביר ידעי (@dvir_yadai) October 15, 2024

Throughout the Israel-Hamas war, Sde Teiman has been used to hold more than 1,000 detainees from Gaza who were suspected of terrorist activity. The majority were suspected of taking part in Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, in which terrorists killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostages, though some were arrested during the subsequent IDF campaign in Gaza.

A petition was filed last year to the High Court of Justice demanding the facility be shut down amid the accusations. In a ruling in September 2024, the court warned the state that it must abide by the law, but did not order the government to shut the prison down.

The court noted in its final decision that conditions at Sde Teiman had changed significantly since the motion was filed. Amid the legal pressure, the government vastly reduced the number of detainees held at the facility from some 700 at its peak to several dozen as of the end of August.

The government also told the court in a written submission that it had reduced the use of restraints, and was providing food and medical treatment in accordance with the requirements of the law.