Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel from Lebanon for months. The latest attack, though one that the terror group denied, struck Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights, where 12 members of the Druze community were killed in a rocket attack. Most of them were children playing on a soccer field. It’s made the Biden administration nervous that a second front of warfare could erupt in the Middle East when the American presidency is historically weak. Yet, planning for how to respond was upended by a domestic unrest incident at an Israeli base.
This incident was no small-scale affair. It lasted for hours. The epicenter for this unprecedented unrest that could hurt Israel’s war efforts is all based in Sde Teiman, or what some call Israel’s Guantanamo Bay. The facility has a detention center where Hamas operatives are being held. One prisoner was given medical attention for injuries sustained to his privates, leading to suspicion that rape and sexual assault were occurring at the base. The investigation into this matter and the Israeli military personnel involved has been ongoing for weeks, according to Axios. When Israeli military police arrived to question almost a dozen soldiers at the base, things became hostile, leading to military bases being stormed in the country:
For 12 hours, Israel was immersed in the unrest as television networks broadcast live from the scene and the defense establishment and political system dealt with the unfolding events. The country's military leaders were forced to turn their focus from preparing for a possible strike against Hezbollah that could spark war on another front to protecting their own base from domestic turmoil.
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The incidents began when Israel Defense Forces (IDF) military police on Monday detained nine reservists who served in the "Force 100" unit at the "Sde Teiman" military base. Sde Teiman was used as a detention facility for Hamas militants involved in the Oct. 7 attacks, and suspects arrested by the IDF in Gaza have also been brought to the base for questioning.
Several reports in the Israeli and international press focused on alleged human rights violations at the base, which some human rights organizations called "the Israeli Guantanamo."
Haaretz reported more than 30 detainees died at the facility since Oct. 7.
The IDF had begun to shut down the detention center in recent weeks after facing significant international criticism. Israeli human rights organizations also appealed to the country's Supreme Court about alleged violations at the base.
Zoom in: The military police investigation into the actions of the nine reservists began several weeks ago after a Hamas operative who was detained at the facility was rushed to a hospital after bleeding from one of his intimate parts of his body, Israeli media reported.
The doctor who examined him concluded he suffered injuries he couldn't have inflicted on himself.
The reservists were detained in connection with abuses of prisoners that included sexual assault and rape, Israeli media outlets reported.
When the military police unit arrived at the base, several of the reservists confronted them and refused to come in for questioning.
After initial reports and videos of the military police raid were posted on social media, ultranationalist ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich and several ministers from Netanyahu's Likud party issued statements condemning the arrests.
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Shortly after, hundreds of protesters arrived at the base, among them several lawmakers from Ben-Gvir and Smotrich's extreme right-wing party, and broke into the base where dozens of Hamas detainees are held. They left the base after several hours when it was clear the reservists who were arrested were no longer there.
The protesters then moved to another military base 30 minutes north of Tel Aviv that hosts military police headquarters, an IDF detention center and the IDF court. They broke into the court and tried breaking into the detention center to release the reservists.
It’s a domestic headache that the government of Benjamin Netanyahu could live without right now. It also shows that his government might not be as stable as initially reported. There will never be a single party that gains an outright majority in the Knesset based on how seats are allocated in Israeli elections. It’s meant to foster coalition governments, where a party with one or two seats could be the difference maker in a new government forming or not. The left will expound on how Netanyahu has juiced the far-right. Maybe he has, maybe he hasn’t, but incidents like this cannot happen when Israel, a nation with no strategic depth, is surrounded by enemies. It especially can’t happen if a second front is about to open up in the north.
