Israel rocked by scandal as high navy lawyer is thrown into jail : NPR

[ad_1] <img src="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/6478x4318+0+0/resize/1100/quality/50/format/jpeg/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F20%2Fc2%2F570fd1c748bf8d83ffe3e10eebf8%2Fap25306666118273.jpg" data-template="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims3/default/strip/false/crop/6478x4318+0+0/resize/{width}/quality/{quality}/format/{format}/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F20%2Fc2%2F570fd1c748bf8d83ffe3e10eebf8%2Fap25306666118273.jpg" class="img" alt="Israel's Military Advocate General Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, at the supreme court in Jerusalem Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024." fetchpriority="high"/> Israel's Navy Advocate Normal Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, on the supreme court docket in Jerusalem Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024. Oren Ben Hakoon/AP disguise caption

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Oren Ben Hakoon/AP JERUSALEM — Till final week, Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi was the Israeli military's high lawyer. Now she is behind bars and on the middle of a scandal rocking the nation after a weird sequence of occasions that included her abrupt resignation, a short disappearance and a frantic search that led authorities to search out her on a Tel Aviv seashore.

The cleaning soap opera-worthy saga was touched off final week by Tomer-Yerushalmi's explosive admission that she authorized the leak of a surveillance video on the middle of a politically divisive investigation into allegations of extreme abuse towards a Palestinian at a infamous Israeli navy jail.

The video reveals a part of an assault wherein Israeli troopers are accused of sexually abusing a Palestinian detainee.

By leaking the video final yr, Tomer-Yerushalmi aimed to reveal the seriousness of the allegations her workplace was investigating. As an alternative, it triggered fierce criticism from Israel's hard-line political leaders. After Tomer-Yerushalmi resigned underneath strain final week, her critics continued to heave private insults.

She left a cryptic observe for her household and deserted her automobile close to a seashore. That led to fears she had taken her personal life and prompted an intensive search that included using navy drones.

She was discovered alive on the seashore Sunday evening, at which level extra vitriol towards her was unleashed.

"We will resume the lynch," right-wing TV persona Yinon Magal, an ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, posted on X with a winking-face emoji.

After it was revealed that one among Tomer-Yerushalmi's telephones had disappeared, right-wing politicians and commentators started to accuse her of staging a suicide try as a strategy to destroy potential proof.

The extraordinary episode reveals two years of devastating conflict have accomplished little to heal a rustic that was deeply divided even earlier than Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, assault. It additionally makes Tomer-Yerushalmi the newest in an extended line of high safety officers who've both left workplace or been compelled out, most of them to get replaced by individuals thought of loyal to Netanyahu and his hardline authorities.

Anger over leak distracts from extreme abuse at coronary heart of case At a court docket listening to Monday, the choose stated Tomer-Yerushalmi's detention can be prolonged till Wednesday on suspicion of committing fraud, breach of belief and obstruction of justice. Whereas the investigation into her actions continues, she is being held at a ladies's jail in central Israel.

Israeli media reported that former chief navy prosecutor Col. Matan Solomesh was additionally arrested in reference to the leak investigation. The prime minister's workplace has refused to touch upon Solomesh's arrest.

The fury over the leaked video reveals the depth of polarization in Israel — and not less than for the second, retains the media and the general public centered on the leak and never the allegations of abuse.

The assault occurred on July 5, 2024, on the Sde Teiman navy jail, in keeping with the indictment towards the accused troopers. The AP has investigated allegations of inhumane remedy and abuse at Sde Teiman that predate these within the surveillance video.

The video, which has been aired by Israeli information, reveals troopers taking a detainee into an space they cordoned off with shields in an obvious try to cover their actions. The indictment stated the troopers assaulted the Palestinian prisoner and sodomized him with a knife, inflicting a number of accidents.

A medical staffer acquainted with the case who spoke on situation of anonymity out of concern for his security stated the detainee arrived at a civilian hospital in life-threatening situation with blunt trauma to the stomach and the chest and fractured ribs.

He stated the detainee underwent surgical procedure for a perforated rectum and was launched again to Sde Teiman days later. The staffer stated it was probably the most excessive abuse case he was acquainted with from Sde Teiman.

When navy police got here to Sde Teiman in July to detain the troopers suspected of abuse, they scuffled with protesters against the arrests. Later, a whole bunch of violent protesters broke into the detention middle.

In her resignation letter, Tomer-Yerushalmi wrote that she had uncovered proof of the abuse to counter the concept that the navy was unfairly concentrating on its personal troopers. That concept was making a hazard to the navy's legislation enforcement, she stated, citing the break-in.

She wrote that the navy had a "obligation to analyze when there's cheap suspicion of violence towards a detainee.

"Sadly, this fundamental understanding — that there are actions which must not ever be taken even towards the vilest of detainees — not convinces everybody," she wrote.

The Palestinian detainee who was the topic of the alleged abuse within the video was launched again to Gaza final month as a part of an alternate between residing hostages and Palestinian prisoners, in keeping with paperwork from the navy prosecutor's workplace obtained by the AP.

The case remains to be pending earlier than the navy court docket.

An online of authorized points Three separate authorized points should be sorted out as a part of Israel's investigation into what occurred at Sde Teiman, stated Yohanan Plesner, the president of the Jerusalem-based assume tank Israel Democracy Institute.

The primary pertains to proof that Israeli troopers abused Palestinian detainees whereas they had been in detention. The second is whether or not Israeli civilians, together with members of parliament, tried to disrupt the investigation by breaking into the navy base the place the troopers accused of the actions had been being held. The third is whether or not Tomer-Yerushalmi allegedly dedicated a bunch of offenses, together with fraud, to undermine the investigation into how the surveillance video was leaked to the media.

The extreme rhetoric over the previous few days is paying homage to what it was like in Israel instantly earlier than the Oct. 7 assault that launched the conflict in Gaza, Plesner stated. On the time, the general public was deeply divided over Netanyahu's push to overtake the judiciary.

The priority for a number of hours Sunday evening about Tomer-Yerushalmi's destiny ought to function a "cease signal" to the Israeli public — and particularly to commentators who derided her personally, Plesner stated.

"It was very unhappy to see how the interior discourse can result in such probably tragic consequence on a private degree," Plesner stated.

It felt particularly symbolic, he stated, that Tomer-Yerushalmi was in court docket whereas the Israeli authorities held its official memorial ceremony marking the thirtieth anniversary of the assassination of then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

Many regard the assassination as Israel's lowest level when it comes to divisions and incitement among the many Israeli public, and fear that the dramatic occasions of the weekend foreshadow Israel's return to an analogous interval of inside strife.

"It was very unhappy to see how the interior discourse can result in such probably tragic consequence on a private degree," Plesner stated. "There is a manner debate our variations in a democratic society."