JERUSALEM — The Israeli Supreme Court considered a petition Wednesday to shutter a desert military prison where soldiers have been accused of abusing Palestinians, as a new video emerged purporting to show the sexual assault of a Palestinian detainee.
Rights groups have been engaged in a legal battle since June to shut down the detention facility, known as Sde Teiman, where Israel has held many Palestinians detained in Gaza during the 10-month war with Hamas. The groups claim that conditions at the facility are grave and that abuse by Israeli soldiers is common, basing their claims on testimony from released detainees and Israeli whistleblowers.
Calls for the prison’s closure ramped up in late July, when Israeli military police arrested 10 soldiers from Sde Teiman on suspicion of their involvement in the alleged sexual assault of a Palestinian detainee at the facility. Five of the soldiers are no longer under investigation. A physician who identified himself as the person who reported the attack said last week that the detainee appeared to have been seriously sexually abused.
The soldiers’ detention triggered angry protests by supporters, and at least two government ministers demanded their release. The response underscored tensions between the military command and hard-line nationalists in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government who advocate even harsher treatment of Palestinians detained from Gaza.
Defense lawyer…
