Defendants in Sde Teiman abuse case say video leak means they can’t get a fair trial

By Jeremy Sharon

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2 November 2025, 2:42 pm

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Jeremy Sharon is The Times of Israel’s legal affairs and settlements reporter

Reserve soldiers indicted for abusing a Palestinian security detainee at the Sde Teiman military detention center speak to the media outside the Supreme Court in Jerusalem on November 2, 2025 (Jeremy Sharon/ Times of Israel)

One of the five soldiers indicted for abusing a Palestinian security detainee at the Sde Teiman military detention center accuses the military justice system of carrying out an unfair “drumhead court martial” against him and his fellow defendants.

Speaking to journalists at a press conference organized by the Honenu legal aid organization outside the Supreme Court, attorneys representing the defendants said that due to the leak of a video from Sde Teiman by the former military advocate general Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, the defendants could not get a fair trial. The indictment process was tainted by her action, they claimed.

“On October 7 we left our families, children, parents, unquestioningly. We knew we had to defend the country. Since that day, dozens of fighters are still fighting for justice not on the battlefield but in courtrooms. Dozens of fighters who need the backing of the country and the system, because they defended our home and we are here only in their merit,” said one of the defendants, who were all wearing ski masks to avoid identification.

Moshe Polski of Honenu claimed that the defendants cannot have a fair trial due to the leak by Tomer-Yerushalmi, saying “the wheel cannot be turned back.”

And the wife of one of the defendants said that the country “spat in the face” of her husband by putting him on trial, saying her husband had “collapsed from the inside, not on the battlefield but because of the country.”

An indictment was filed against five IDF reserve soldiers in February this year for beating and severely assaulting a Palestinian security prisoner after he was brought to the detention facility in July 2024. The assault left him with severe injuries, including broken ribs and a tear in his rectum.

Numerous allegations have been made by Israeli whistleblowers, former detainees, and civil rights organizations that detainees at Sde Teiman were subjected to severe abuse, including physical assault and beatings, psychological abuse, humiliation, neglect of medical problems, and the deprivation of adequate food and sanitary conditions.