Dozens of Israeli Soldiers Walk Out of Sde Teiman Base After Clash With Commanders

TEL AVIV, Jul 30: Dozens of Israeli soldiers walked out of the Sde Teiman military base in southern Israel on Thursday following a dispute with senior commanders, according to Israeli media reports.

The soldiers are members of the Sabar Battalion of the Givati Brigade, The Jerusalem Post reported.

According to the newspaper, tensions arose after the battalion’s command staff decided to remove and destroy symbols displayed by the battalion’s companies. The battalion commander reportedly insisted on implementing the decision despite opposition from soldiers.

“One of the commanders used a five-kilogram sledgehammer to destroy one of the symbols,” a soldier serving with the unit told Israeli news website Walla, according to The Jerusalem Post.

The dispute reportedly escalated after the soldiers and commanders failed to reach an agreement. The soldiers then left the unit and walked out of the base, the report said.

Sde Teiman, located in Israel’s Negev Desert, has faced longstanding scrutiny over the treatment of Palestinians detained from the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian and Israeli media outlets, as well as human rights organizations, have reported allegations of beatings, prolonged restraint, inadequate medical care and deaths in custody at the facility. The detention site has also been compared by critics to the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Palestinian rights groups say that more than 9,600 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli prisons, including around 350 children and 84 women, amid continued allegations of torture, medical neglect and other forms of ill-treatment.