The Military Prosecution this morning requested to extend the detention of five of the suspected soldiers until Wednesday in order to carry out further investigative activities.
In the case of the other three suspected soldiers, the Military Prosecution requested, at this stage, to extend their detention by several hours in order to complete necessary investigative actions. Upon their completion, a decision will be made regarding their continued detention, and it is expected that they will be released tonight.
The hearing regarding the eight suspects is currently taking place, and a judicial decision will be made later today
The prosecutor requested that the detention of the other three suspects be extended by several hours rather than several days in order to complete investigative tasks. While a final decision is expected later today, it is likely that these three soldiers will be released tonight.
Protests broke out at the Sde Teiman base Monday afternoon after masked Military Police investigators raided the base where Hamas Nukhba terrorists are being held and detained eight IDF reservists suspected of abusing a detained terrorist. The suspicions were reportedly based on medical findings in a hospital indicating the terrorist had suffered trauma to the buttocks while in custody.
Physical clashes broke out at the scene between the MPs and the reservists. During the arrests, several of the soldiers barricaded themselves in the base and refused to go into custody. The suspects are from Force 100, a special Military Police Corps unit for high-risk prison facilities.
Among the protestors were Knesset members Zvi Sukkot and Nissim Vaturi, and Minister Amichai Eliyahu, who entered the base together with the many protestors.
Later, protestors managed to break into the military police base at Beit Lid Monday evening in protest against the arrest of the eight soldiers.
The suspects' attorneys have stated that the prisoner had attacked their clients, who responded with appropriate force.
On Wednesday, Attorney Nati Rom from the Honenu legal organization presented his clients' version of the incident. "My clients were asked by the prison commander to conduct a search on several prisoners who were brought to the facility due to the high risk they represented."
"These prisoners were defined as violent and dangerous. During the body search of the terrorist, he began to attack them, tried to bite two soldiers, tried to grab the taser gun one of the soldiers was holding. So they had to use force to restrain him. The soldiers did not strip the terrorist during the search and used reasonable force given the situation. There is a lot of fake news in the media," he said.