Sgt. Yosef Pilent, who faces one month imprisonment for protesting the IDF’s removal of two trailers near Yitzhar, said his trial was “completely fictitious.” Pilent, an immigrant from the United States who has lived most of his life in Israel in Yitzhar, claimed in his appeal that he was not given an opportunity to consult with his lawyer before he was sentenced and that the army did not allow him to bring proof that the order to destroy the two empty trailers was illegal.
“The whole process took no more than five minutes when the adjudging officer ruled according to what he saw on television without checking the facts,” said Pilent’s lawyer Shai Galilee.
Pilent was on furlough last week when he saw his own unit destroying the homes at Givat Lehavah, a community near Yitzhar. His brother and fiancee were considering moving to one of the destroyed homes after their wedding this spring.
Pilent was charged with “unbefitting behavior” after he explained he could not be charged with refusing orders that he had not received. “Their main goal is to use me as a scapegoat and put me in jail,” he added.
The government continued its campaign against others who have claimed that it is illegal for army to issue orders to remove Jews from their homes, as the government proposes in its goal to dismantle 25 Jewish communities.
Police interrogated Kedumim mayor Daniella Weiss Sunday on suspicion that she violated the law by her call last week that soldiers refuse to carry out eviction orders.
The army is expected to decide Sunday night or Monday on the fate of 34 IDF officers who wrote a letter last week concerning the illegality of eviction orders. Their commander had demanded they retract the letter or face expulsion from the army. The officers, reservists in the Binyamin Brigade in Samaria, wrote a second letter to their commander in which they declared they had not proposed that they or other soldiers should refuse orders.
But the officers did not retract their claim that “every order to execute the disengagement is a blatantly illegal order” and that “soldiers are forbidden to carry out such orders.”
They are to meet Major General Moshe Kaplinski, commanding officer of the Central Command, Sunday night when he may decide whether they remain in the armed forces.
At an earlier meeting Sunday, the officers rejected a modified letter presented to them by their brigade commander Col. Miki Edelstein. “We had a thorough debate that was very difficult. Edelstein presented a modification of our modified letter and asked that we sign it. However, we could not accept,” said Lt. Col. Yitzhak Shadmi.
“The whole process took no more than five minutes when the adjudging officer ruled according to what he saw on television without checking the facts,” said Pilent’s lawyer Shai Galilee.
Pilent was on furlough last week when he saw his own unit destroying the homes at Givat Lehavah, a community near Yitzhar. His brother and fiancee were considering moving to one of the destroyed homes after their wedding this spring.
Pilent was charged with “unbefitting behavior” after he explained he could not be charged with refusing orders that he had not received. “Their main goal is to use me as a scapegoat and put me in jail,” he added.
The government continued its campaign against others who have claimed that it is illegal for army to issue orders to remove Jews from their homes, as the government proposes in its goal to dismantle 25 Jewish communities.
Police interrogated Kedumim mayor Daniella Weiss Sunday on suspicion that she violated the law by her call last week that soldiers refuse to carry out eviction orders.
The army is expected to decide Sunday night or Monday on the fate of 34 IDF officers who wrote a letter last week concerning the illegality of eviction orders. Their commander had demanded they retract the letter or face expulsion from the army. The officers, reservists in the Binyamin Brigade in Samaria, wrote a second letter to their commander in which they declared they had not proposed that they or other soldiers should refuse orders.
But the officers did not retract their claim that “every order to execute the disengagement is a blatantly illegal order” and that “soldiers are forbidden to carry out such orders.”
They are to meet Major General Moshe Kaplinski, commanding officer of the Central Command, Sunday night when he may decide whether they remain in the armed forces.
At an earlier meeting Sunday, the officers rejected a modified letter presented to them by their brigade commander Col. Miki Edelstein. “We had a thorough debate that was very difficult. Edelstein presented a modification of our modified letter and asked that we sign it. However, we could not accept,” said Lt. Col. Yitzhak Shadmi.