Former Israel Defense Forces Military Advocate General Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, who resigned last week after admitting to her role in a leak scandal, was arrested on Sunday after going missing for several hours.
Tomer-Yerushalmi was located at a beach in the city of Herzliya on Sunday night after her family reported her missing, prompting an hours-long search involving police officers, soldiers and other forces.
Local media reported that she left notes at home and in her abandoned car, which was found less than a mile south of the beach where she was eventually located. One letter reportedly read, “Children, I love you, be strong,” and some Hebrew outlets characterized it as a suicide note.
The Israel Police announced around 7 p.m. that “following the searches for a missing person in the coastal area of Herzliya, it has now been reported that the missing person has been found safe and sound.”
After a medical check-up, Tomer-Yerushalmi was arrested on charges of “leaking and other serious criminal offenses,” police said. Former IDF Chief Military Prosecutor Col. Matan Solomosh was also detained.
On Friday, Tomer-Yerushalmi admitted she had approved the leak of video footage allegedly showing the mistreatment of terrorist detainees from Gaza, claiming she had done so in an attempt to “fend off false propaganda directed against military law enforcement authorities.”
Her resignation came within 48 hours after she went on leave pending the investigation into her office’s involvement in the leak.
The footage from the Sde Teiman detention center in the Negev Desert allegedly documents an assault on a Hamas terrorist by five IDF reservists. The criminal probe into the incident and the subsequent arrest of nine troops sparked outrage among right-wing Israelis and lawmakers.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday blamed Tomer-Yerushalmi for “perhaps the most severe public relations attack the State of Israel has experienced since its establishment.”
The leaked footage “caused immense damage to the image of the State of Israel and the IDF, to our soldiers,” he said ahead of a Cabinet meeting.
Netanyahu said the public-relations damage Jerusalem suffered due to the leak was more “focused with such intensity” than any previous assault on Israel’s international legitimacy that he could recall.
“This requires an independent, impartial investigation, and I expect such an investigation to take place,” the premier added, speaking several hours before Tomer-Yerushalmi was reported missing.
Depending on the developments, Tomer-Yerushalmi and Solomosh are expected to be brought before the Tel Aviv’s Magistrate’s Court on Monday, where police will request to extend their detention.
On Saturday night, Israeli Justice Minister Yariv Levin ordered outgoing Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara to refrain from investigating the leak, alleging she might have obstructed the probe in recent months, including by making false statements to the High Court of Justice.
Levin pointed specifically to Baharav-Miara’s September statement to the court saying all investigative avenues had been exhausted and the leaker could not be identified—an assertion he suggested had been false.
The investigation into the leak was reopened last week after an officer in the Military Advocate General’s Office revealed her involvement during an interview following a failed routine polygraph test, Ynet reported.
Baharav-Miara on Sunday rejected Levin’s request that she stay out of the investigation, saying the demand lacked “any factual or legal basis.”
The Israeli Cabinet in August unanimously passed a motion to dismiss Baharav-Miara, though the High Court of Justice immediately ordered the decision frozen pending legal proceedings against the move.
