TEL AVIV – The Israeli military said Monday 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 center.
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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 Lt. Gen. 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 Oct. 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.
The detentions came as international mediators are trying to bring Hamas and Israel to agree to a cease-fire deal that would wind down the war in Gaza and free the remaining 110 hostages held there.
Officials from Egypt and Hamas said Monday that mediators were still working to smooth out sticking points.
The officials, who have direct knowledge of the negotiations, said the contentious points include what they called new Israeli demands to maintain a presence in a strip of land on the Gaza-Egypt border known as the Philadelphi corridor, as well as along a highway running across the breadth of the strip, separating Gaza’s south and north.
Israel says it needs to control the highway to stop militants from returning to the north when civilians are eventually allowed back. Currently, troops there prevent any returns of the displaced to the north and monitor those fleeing to the south, arresting any they suspect of militant ties.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the sensitive talks with the media.
They said Israel refuses to leave the area between Egypt and Gaza during the cease-fire. They said Israel has linked its forces’ departure from the border corridor to installing underground sensors and an underground wall to monitor any future efforts by Hamas to build tunnels or smuggle weapons.
Officials in Israel did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Israel says Hamas uses tunnels that pass under the corridor to smuggle weapons, although Egypt denies the allegation and says it destroyed many in an earlier crackdown.
Israel’s military seized control of the Philadelphi corridor in early May along with the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza when it began its invasion of Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah.
The Egyptian official said no agreement has been reached on the corridor and the reopening of Rafah, adding that Egypt and Israel were continuing direct talks on a compromise.
White House national security spokesman John Kirby on Monday declined to comment on the reports of Israel hardening its demands. He said that the U.S. administration still believes an agreement remains “close” to being achieved.
“There are teams at work right now trying to close these gaps,” Kirby told reporters. “So again, we believe the gaps can be narrowed.”
Hamas denounced the Israeli demands in a statement, saying Netanyahu had “returned to the strategy of procrastination, delay, and evasion from reaching an agreement by setting new conditions and demands.”
The Hamas official said the group will hand its written response to mediators from Qatar and Egypt in the coming days.
Netanyahu's office denied making new demands, saying its calls for control over the border and the highway were “in accordance with the original outline” of the peace deal, though the U.S.-backed outline made no mention of then. “The Hamas leadership is preventing a deal" by seeking changes, it said in a statement.
The U.S.-backed plan calls for a three-phase cease-fire starting with a 45-day truce and partial hostage release. During that time, the two sides are to negotiate the second phase, which is supposed to lead to a full hostage release in return for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Hamas is seeking written guarantees that the cease-fire will continue until those talks reach a deal, while Israeli officials have said they want a time limit on the talks.
CIA director William Burns, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed Bin Abdul Rahman al-Thani and Egypt’s head of intelligence Abbas Kamel met Sunday with Mossad chief David Barnea in Rome to discuss Israel’s latest demands.
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Magdy reported from Cairo.
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Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war