IDF soldiers arrested over alleged mistreatment of Palestinian detainees

Five Israel Defense Forces soldiers were arrested by military police Thursday, following suspicions of mistreatment of Palestinians detainees, which  included taking improper photographs.

	IDF soldiers with Palestinian detainees.
	Photo by: Breaking the Silence

The soldiers, members of the Nahal Haredi combat unit, were arrested following information received by their battalion commander, which claimed that two of the five soldiers were involved in drug use, while the rest are suspected of taking photographs of themselves alongside cuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainees using their cellphones.

Four of the five IDF soldiers were remanded by military police by four days, with the fifth due to appear before a remand hearing on Friday.

The arrest came after earlier this week a storm erupted over the Facebook images of a former IDF soldier, Eden Abergil, who had taken photographs of herself alongside bound Palestinian detainees.

Photographs uploaded by Abergil and labeled "IDF – the best time of my life," depicted her smiling next to Palestinian prisoners with their hands bound and their eyes covered.

A comment attached to one of the photos of the soldier smiling in front of two blindfold men and posted by one of Abergil's friends read "That looks really sexy for you," with Abergil's response reading: "I wonder if he is on Facebook too – I'll have to tag him in the photo."

On Thursday, a comment allegedly added by Abergil to her Facebook page saying that she would "gladly kill Arabs – even slaughter them."

"In war there are no rules," Abergil allegedly wrote on the wall of her profile page on the social network Facebook.

Reacting to Abergil's initial upload of the controversial images, the IDF spokesman issued its response Thursdays, saying "on the face of it the behavior exhibited by the soldier is base and crude."