High Court expected to rule today on who will oversee probe into Sde Teiman scandal

The High Court of Justice is expected to rule today on who will oversee the criminal investigation into the Sde Teiman video leak scandal, a case that has roiled the country and the justice system.

Justice Minister Yariv Levin has insisted that the Attorney General’s Office and State Attorney’s Office cannot be allowed to run the probe, asserting that they are compromised in the case. The latter have rejected his effort to appoint his preferred candidate — the state ombudsman for judges — to run the investigation, calling it improper political intervention in a criminal process.

High Court judges had indicated last week that they believed a possible solution was to appoint a retired Supreme Court judge to lead the probe. They urged the sides to reach a compromise but this did not happen.

In the case, former military advocate general Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi has admitted that she authorized the leak of a video last year purporting to show the abuse of a Palestinian security detainee by IDF soldiers at the Sde Teiman military facility. She then lied about the matter while ostensibly leading the investigation to find the leaker.

Levin, who has for months sought to push Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara out of office, then moved to install State Ombudsman Asher Kula to oversee the criminal investigation, arguing that Baharav-Miara had a conflict of interest because she oversaw what appears to have been a compromised investigation by the Military Advocate General’s Office.

Baharav-Miara eventually agreed to step away from the case but insisted that it should be run by State Attorney Amit Aisman. Levin rejected this arrangement, arguing that as her subordinate, Aisman too was compromised. Opposition figures suspect Levin’s insistence on sidelining Israel’s top legal officials is aimed less at safeguarding the investigation and more at weakening their institutions.