An Israeli army lawyer was arrested on Monday in a scandal over leaked footage that appeared to show the abuse of a Palestinian in detention.
After resigning on Friday and going missing briefly on Sunday, Ms Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi was detained alongside another suspect on Monday. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir ordered "extra vigilance" to ensure her safety in custody.
The former military advocate general – senior prosecutor in the legal unit of Israel's military – had admitted leaking the footage, which documented alleged sexual abuse of a Palestinian inmate at Sde Teiman detention centre.
The video, which surfaced in August 2024, provoked outrage internationally but sparked a different scandal in Israel, with many rushing to defend the army. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the leak on Sunday as "perhaps the most severe public relations attack that the state of Israel has experienced since its establishment".
The Palestinian detainee was treated for severe injuries, including some typical of sexual abuse victims. Five Israeli reservists were charged over the video. All have denied alleged aggravated abuse and causing serious bodily harm.
Their legal team claimed the video was part of a “cooked-up legal process” at the weekend.
The scandal took a dramatic turn on Sunday evening after Ms Tomer-Yerushalmi went missing, leading to fears for her welfare as interest in the case grew. She was eventually discovered hours after the alarm was raised, prompting a moment of soul-searching from some politicians who called on the public to dial down the rhetoric in the emotive case.
Much of the right is billing the leaking as the corrupt machinations of an overly powerful judiciary it sees as biased towards the left.
However, tension soon escalated after the police suggested Ms Tomer-Yerushalmi might have gone missing so as to dispose of her phone, fearing it might reveal damaging material, Israeli new outlet Haaretz reported.
Echoing widespread anger on the right, Likud party politician Tally Gotliv said: “The military advocate general's suicide attempt is just another try at regaining control of the discourse and removing her shameful acts from the headlines.”
The episode lays bare one of the most divisive issues in Israeli politics, namely the power of the judiciary and whether it operates in a way that subverts the democratic mandate of governments.
The debate came to a head before the Gaza war, when Mr Netanyahu’s far-right government launched a bitterly divisive push to radically change the nature of Israel’s judiciary, which sparked months of mass protests.
In a resignation letter, Ms Tomer-Yerushalmi said she had allowed the leaks to “debunk false propaganda against army law enforcement bodies”.
Most Israeli criticism of Ms Tomer-Yerushalmi focused on her breaking the military’s rules and stoking anger against Israeli soldiers. Far-left politician Ofer Cassif, however, said she should be tried not for leaking the material “but for her central role in the war crimes and crimes against humanity that she enabled and normalised”.
Israel’s military legal unit has long faced accusations of not investigating alleged war crimes by its own troops, including in detention centres, a charge that reached new heights after the massive Palestinian civilian casualties of the Gaza war.
