Israeli soldiers indicted over detainee treatment
The colonel and sergeant face prison if convicted in videotaped episode in which blindfolded Palestinian was shot point-blank with a rubber-coated bullet.
JERUSALEM — An Israeli battalion commander and a staff sergeant caught on film allegedly abusing a handcuffed, blindfolded Palestinian detainee were indicted by a military court Thursday on the charge of "unworthy conduct."
The July 7 incident, in which the sergeant fired a rubber-coated bullet at point-blank range and bruised the detainee's toe, embarrassed the army and focused renewed attention on its role in policing unruly demonstrations in the West Bank.
Lt. Col. Omri Borberg resigned his command of an armored battalion on the eve of Thursday's indictment but will continue to serve elsewhere pending trial in military court, a military spokesman said. The commander and the sergeant, who wasn't identified in the indictment, could each receive a maximum jail sentence of one year.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak had condemned the two soldiers' behavior. A statement reporting the Military Advocate General's decision to indict the men said their conduct reflects a "severe moral failure of command."
But the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem, which brought the incident to light and branded it a war crime, said the decision by the army not to press more serious charges "disgraces the values it pretends to uphold."
Video distributed by the group showed Borberg holding 27-year-old Ashraf abu Rahmeh by the arm while the sergeant took aim and fired at the detainee's foot. The images were captured by a 17-year-old Palestinian girl documenting a rock-throwing protest in Nilin, a Palestinian village near the West Bank administrative capital of Ramallah.
The sergeant told a closed military hearing this week that he opened fire upon Borberg's orders, according to an army summary. Borberg said he told the sergeant only to shake his rifle to frighten the Palestinian.
The protest was part of a near-daily Palestinian campaign that employs violent and peaceful tactics to prevent Israeli work crews from installing a barrier to seal off the Jewish state from the West Bank. Army units policing the work are frequently pelted with rocks and respond with tear gas, rubber-coated steel bullets and at times live ammunition.
Israeli rifle fire killed a 10-year-old boy last week following a protest in Nilin against the barrier, which is separating the village from hundreds of acres of its olive groves. The army is investigating that episode.
