The Israeli military said it was holding nine soldiers for questioning following allegations of “substantial abuse” of a detainee at a shadowy facility where Israel has held Palestinian prisoners throughout the war in Gaza.
The military did not disclose additional details surrounding the alleged abuse, saying only that its top legal official had launched a probe.
An investigation by The Associated Press and reports by rights groups have exposed abysmal conditions and abuses at the Sde Teiman facility, the country’s largest detention centre.
A report by the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, earlier this year said that detainees alleged they were subjected to ill-treatment and abuse while in Israeli custody, without specifying the facility.
The military has generally denied ill-treatment of detainees.
Following the accusations of harsh treatment that prompted a court case, Israel said it was transferring the bulk of Palestinian detainees out of Sde Teiman and upgrading it.
Israeli media reported that military police officers who arrived at Sde Teiman in southern Israel to detain the soldiers were met with protests and scuffles.
Later, dozens of protesters who had come to show support for the soldiers burst through the facility’s gate, waving Israeli flags and chanting “shame”.
After the military cleared the protesters, several hundred of them broke into the military base where the nine soldiers were taken for questioning.
Video showed a swarm of people scuffling, pushing and shoving with soldiers in the base.
Some of the protesters were masked and carried guns. Others called through megaphones for the soldiers’ immediate release.
Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi condemned the protesters’ break-in at Sde Teiman and said he fully supports the military prosecutors’ investigation into the abuse allegation.
“It is precisely these investigations that protect our soldiers in Israel and the world and preserve the values” of the military, he said.
Israel has detained thousands of Palestinians since the October 7 Hamas attack that sparked the war in Gaza, according to official figures, though hundreds were released after the military determined they were not affiliated with Hamas.
Israeli human rights groups say the majority of detainees have at some point passed through Sde Teiman.
The Public Committee Against Torture in Israel said it welcomed the military’s investigation but said its claims are of systemic abuse at the facility and not just one case.
Israel has long been accused of failing to hold its soldiers accountable for crimes committed against Palestinians.
The allegations have intensified during the war in Gaza.
Israel says its forces act within military and international law and says it independently investigates any alleged abuses.
The detentions of soldiers prompted an outcry among members of Israel’s far-right government, who called the investigation into their conduct an affront to their service.
“Our soldiers are not criminals and this despicable pursuit of our soldiers is unacceptable to me,” Yuli Edelstein, a veteran lawmaker from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, wrote on the platform X, formerly Twitter.
The detentions came as international mediators are trying to bring Hamas and Israel to agree to a ceasefire deal that would wind down the war in Gaza and free the remaining 110 hostages held there.
