Israel Defense Forces Military Advocate General Brig. Gen Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi has been put on leave pending an investigation into the leaking of video footage allegedly showing the mistreatment of Palestinian detainees by Israeli soldiers, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Wednesday.
The decision “is correct and necessary and I fully support it,” Katz stated in Hebrew.
Earlier Wednesday, the IDF announced that a criminal probe had been opened into the leak, adding that involvement of “elements in the Military Advocate General’s Office” was being investigated.
Contrary to Katz’s claim that Tomer-Yerushalmi had been suspended pending the investigation, the IDF’s Spokesperson’s Unit said Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir had “approved the request of the military advocate general to go on leave until further details on the matter are clarified.”
According to the defense minister’s statement, the leak gave rise to “one of the most serious blood libels ever made” against the Israeli military, exposing soldiers “to persecution and lawsuits around the world.”
“The military advocate general will not return to her position as long as the case is under investigation, and when it concludes, we will act in accordance with the findings,” Katz’s Hebrew X post concluded.
On July 29, 2024, IDF Military Police arrested nine reservists guarding the Sde Teiman detention center in the Negev as part of a probe into an incident of alleged sexual abuse of a imprisoned Hamas terrorist captured in Gaza.
“Following a suspicion of serious abuse of a detainee who was held in the prison facility, an investigation by the Military Police was opened by order of the Military Advocate General’s Office,” the IDF said at the time.
One terrorist was evacuated by the Military Police to Beersheva’s Soroka Medical Center with bruises on his buttocks, according to Israel Hayom.
The reservists’ arrest sparked outrage among many right-wing Israelis, and protesters, including several members of Knesset, subsequently burst through the gates of two IDF military bases to vent their rage.
During the investigation, security camera footage recording the troops’ purported conduct, allegedly proving an assault on the terrorist by five reservists stationed at Sde Teiman, leaked to Israel’s Channel 12 News.
In August 2024, a medical opinion submitted to the court suggested the soldiers could be innocent. Professor Alon Pikarsky, director of general surgery at Jerusalem’s Hadassah-University Medical Center, said the terrorist had possibly injured himself by inserting a foreign body.
The accused troops have also rejected the allegations, claiming in court that the recording had been doctored using footage from two separate days and that they used proportionate force to subdue the terrorist.
Following the opening of the investigation into the leak on Wednesday, lawyers for several suspects indicted in the abuse case demanded that military prosecutors drop the criminal charges against their clients.
Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called the decision to open an investigation into the leaking of the footage “a dramatic shift in protecting democracy from criminal behavior disguised as legal action.
“Everyone implicated in the matter should be held accountable,” the right-wing minister added in his X post on Wednesday afternoon.
Likud Party MK Ofir Katz, who serves as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition whip, said the video “severely harmed IDF soldiers, led to blood libels against them worldwide, and someone must pay!”
Fellow Likud Party lawmaker Avichai Boaron said the “fabricated video” was merely “the tip of the iceberg of a system that has done everything, including tarnishing Israel’s reputation in the world, to advance its own agenda in opposition to decision-makers and the elected leadership.”
In September 2024, Israel’s Supreme Court, sitting as the High Court of Justice, rejected a petition asking it to order the closure of Sde Teiman.
The makeshift detention center near the southern city of Beersheva has been housing terrorists captured in Gaza, many of whom were directly involved in the attacks and atrocities against civilians on Oct. 7, 2023.
While the Supreme Court stopped short of ordering the facility’s closure, it mandated that the state must strictly adhere to legal requirements in its treatment of prisoners. The ruling came amid significant changes at Sde Teiman, with Jerusalem having drastically reduced the number of detainees there from some 700 at its peak to just several dozen.
