Israeli Army’s Ex-Chief Lawyer Held Over Expanding Video Leak Probe

A former top lawyer for the Israeli military has been arrested as a political firestorm deepens over a leaked

sarah

Nov 3, 2025 - 19:57

Israeli Army’s Ex-Chief Lawyer Held Over Expanding Video Leak Probe

Major General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi resigned last week from her position as the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Military Advocate General, saying she took full responsibility for the leak.

On Sunday, the story took a new turn when she was reported missing, and police searched for her for hours on a beach north of Tel Aviv.

Police said she was later found alive and well, but was then taken into custody.

The fallout from the leaked video continues to grow.

The footage, broadcast on an Israeli news channel in August 2024, shows reserve soldiers at the Sde Teiman military base in southern Israel taking a prisoner aside, then surrounding him with riot shields and beating him, and allegedly inserting a sharp object into his rectum.

The prisoner was later treated for serious injuries.

Five reserve soldiers were subsequently charged with aggravated abuse and causing serious bodily harm to the prisoner. They have denied the charges, and their names have not been released.

On Sunday, four of the reserve soldiers, wearing black balaclavas to conceal their faces, held a news conference outside the Supreme Court in Jerusalem with their lawyers, who demanded that their trial be dismissed.

Adi Kedar, a lawyer from the right-wing legal aid organization Honenu, claimed his clients were victims of "a flawed, biased and completely fabricated legal process."

On Monday, it emerged that the prisoner at the center of the case had been released to Gaza in October as part of a prisoner exchange with Hamas. In this exchange, prisoners held by Israel without charge were released in exchange for those taken hostage by Hamas since October 7, 2023.

General Tomer-Yerushalmi was placed on leave during the investigation.

On Friday, Defense Minister Israel Katz said she would not be allowed to return to her position.

Shortly afterward, General Tomer-Yerushalmi resigned.

In her resignation letter, she stated that she took full responsibility for any material released to the media from the unit. She said, "I authorized the release of material to the media in an attempt to counter false propaganda against the army's law enforcement officers."

This refers to attempts by some right-wing political figures in Israel to claim that the allegations of serious abuse of a Palestinian prisoner were fabricated.

She further stated: "Whenever there is reasonable suspicion of acts of violence against a prisoner, it is our duty to investigate."

Following her resignation, Katz strongly condemned her conduct.

He said, "Anyone who spreads false blood libels against IDF soldiers is not worthy of wearing the army uniform."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu echoed his defense minister's remarks on Sunday, saying the Sde Teiman incident was "perhaps the most serious public relations attack since the founding of the State of Israel."

A few hours later, initial reports began to surface in Israeli media that General Tomer-Yerushalmi was missing, raising fears that a political scandal had turned into a tragedy.

A large-scale search operation was launched. Israeli police said that several hours later, she was found "safe and in good health" in the coastal area of Herzliya. Overnight, a police spokesperson announced that two people had been arrested as part of the investigation on suspicion of "leaking and other serious criminal offenses."

Israeli media reported that these two were General Tomer-Yerushalmi and the former chief military prosecutor, Colonel Matan Solomosh.

The Sde Teiman incident has become a major point of division between left-wing and right-wing factions in Israel.

Right-wingers condemn the video leak as an attempt to defame the Israeli military, tantamount to near-treason.

After Israeli military police visited Sde Teiman in July 2024 to question 11 reserve soldiers in connection with the incident, far-right protesters—including at least three members of Netanyahu's ruling coalition—infiltrated the facility to show their support.

Left-wingers view General Tomer-Yerushalmi's decision to release the footage as a moment when he upheld his responsibilities in his position.

Left-wingers consider the video to be concrete evidence supporting numerous reports of mistreatment of Palestinian prisoners since the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023. Last October, a UN commission of inquiry report alleged that thousands of children and adults from Gaza had been subjected to "widespread and systematic ill-treatment, physical and mental violence, and sexual and gender-based violence amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity, namely torture and war crimes, namely rape and other forms of sexual violence."