Protesters’ defence of abusive soldiers exposes Israel's moral crisis

In a sign of true moral bankruptcy, many Israeli citizens have begun protesting soldiers' right to abuse Palestinian prisoners.

Earlier this week, crowds gathered at the Sde Teinman detention facility in southern Israel, angry about a military police investigation into Israeli soldiers who gangraped a Palestinian prisoner.

The response by the Israeli far-right when it comes to holding perpetrators accountable for their actions has been both chilling and increasingly mainstream ever since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assembled his sixth cabinet in 2022.

The far-right movement is vocal, prominent and representative, and dominates the country's strategic thinking on Palestine.

It also represents a push in Israel to support prisoner abuse, which is in defiance of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War.

What happened

On July 29, Israeli media reported that a Palestinian prisoner was gangraped by Israeli reservist soldiers at the Sde Teinman prison, which is already notorious for harrowing prisoner abuse, defying acceptable standards of morality and human dignity.

According to Israeli whistleblowers in May 2024, Sde Teinman was characterised by acts such as doctors amputating Palestinian prisoners' limbs, strapping them to beds and stripping them naked.

The latest case is that of a man who suffered severe anal trauma, had fractured ribs and required immediate treatment which shocked Dr. Yoel Donchin of Sde Teinman, who stated that if the Israeli state and Knesset members believe there is no limit to prisoner abuse, they should kill themselves like some German Nazis did out of shame or shut down the hospitals.

Once the incident received media coverage, a contingent of Israeli military police came to arrest the perpetrators for their crimes.

Yet what followed was not an outpour of condemnation for the egregious human rights violations committed by Israeli reservists, but a concerted attempt by Israeli politicians and their supporters to lionise the rapists as "heroes."

Again, this constitutes moral bankruptcy.

Normalising prisoner abuse

The far-right Netanyahu government with its constituencies and supporters rushed to denounce the arrest operation, with many of them flooding the Sde Teinman facility to prevent the arrests.

Important to note is that Netanyahu himself made unconvincing appeals for "calm," which is due to him facing increased domestic and international criticism for carrying out a genocide against Palestinians.

Also, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant urged the authorised parties to carry out investigations without condemning the soldiers.

Beyond such cosmetic manoeuvres from the very top, were a flurry of messages, comments and posts which reflect the dehumanisation of Palestinians in Israeli society and politics.

Comments came from settlement advocate and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and notorious far-right Zionist supremacist and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, both of whom demanded the release of Israel's so-called "heroic warriors."

Despite incontrovertible evidence of crimes against humanity violating Article 13 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, which states that any unlawful act or omission of the detaining power causing death or endangering the health of the prisoner of war is strictly prohibited, Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman and a member of Netanyahu's Likud party, Yuli Edelstein, unabashedly stated that the soldiers were not criminals.

It doesn't stop there. Vitriolic comments condemning the accountability process was followed by mob violence, where sitting government ministers, politicians, soldiers in uniform as well as members of the parliament broke into the prison camp.

When the rogue soldiers were taken away by military police to the Beit Lid prison facility, the mob repeated their attempts to break into Beit Lid, despite such actions constituting serious violations of international law.

Impunity

This incident, as has been the case with previous instances of abuses such as electric shocks, severe beatings, dehydration and rape at the Sde Teiman facility, represents a reflection of Israeli society, politics and advocacy.

It lies beneath the veneer of so called hosting a "moral" army and equating the genocide of Palestinians with a clash against the "civilized world," which Israeli politicians such as Netanyahu champion.

This explains why concerted attempts to campaign for shielding soldiers/criminals from any prosecution while simultaneously demonising Palestinian citizens as supporters of terrorism has been successful. Israel has gotten away with its hypocritical stance of supporting human rights on one hand, while gangrapes take place within its own facilities.

One reason is institutionalised impunity facilitated by the "Global North" or Western countries, as stated by legal officer at the International Center of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP), Zaki Sarraf.

Sarraf contends that whatever crimes against humanity Israel commits, governments in the United States and United Kingdom provide Israel with diplomatic cover. There are reasons as to why that is the case.

Narratives on Israel's genocide in the US and UK disproportionately focus on Hamas, Israeli hostages and security threats. This explains why there has been no statement condemning the far-right protests at Sde Teiman from Washington or London.

Such impunity also exists with Israel's open flouting of the International Court of Justice's advisory opinions and rulings, which have been met with silence from Netanyahu's allies.

It sends a disturbing message that violations such as prison abuse by Israel would be guarded over the "right to self-defense" argument which has been cited repeatedly whenever Israel launches a genocide against Palestinians.

This emboldens Israel's political culture which under Netanyahu has endorsed pro-Zionist, pro-occupation and genocidal ideologies. Hence, any abuse by its so-called moral army would have to be defended as killing of Palestinians is considered a right inherent to Israelis who are righteous owners of Palestinian land.

For the far-right, all Palestinians are potential terrorists and their extrajudicial killing is justified.

Hence, Sde Teinam warrants greater condemnation from the international community. It is clear that similar to Nazi Germany, Israel's political culture is supportive of genocidal tendencies and abuse of humanity.