At the edge of Israel’s Negev desert lies Sde Teiman, a military facility that has gone global for all the wrong reasons.

For months, little was known about what went on inside — until a video emerged that Israel could not ignore.

The leaked security camera footage that first emerged in July 2024 showed rows of Palestinian detainees forced to lie facedown while masked Israeli reservists patrolled above them.

One detainee was dragged into a corner out of the camera’s view, with soldiers seen holding shields up, presumably to block the camera. What happened next, investigators later claimed, left him bleeding and in need of emergency surgery.

The images set off a political earthquake inside Israel. Five Israeli soldiers were charged with aggravated abuse and causing serious bodily harm.

Inside the facility, a military doctor later told the Haaretz publication that he could “not believe an Israeli prison guard could do such a thing.”

But it wasn’t the assault that sent shockwaves through Israel’s government and military. The issue of who leaked the footage was what got officials particularly hot under the collar.

The scandal has therefore raised extremely important questions over morality during wartime.

The footage reached Israeli television months later, broadcast by Channel 12. Within days, protests erupted outside the Sde Teiman base.

Among the demonstrators were politicians from the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, who stormed the site in defiance of police orders.

The decision to arrest the soldiers had come from Major General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, the IDF’s top legal adviser. To some, she was simply defending the rule of law. But to others, she had betrayed her soldiers in wartime.

“The people of Israel are fighting outside enemies while enemies are trying to eat away at it from within,” declared Otzma Yehudit parliamentarian Limor Son Har-Melech, who described the general’s order as “criminal.”

Her party leader, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, went even further, branding the soldiers’ arrest “nothing less than shameful.”

Eli Cohen, a senior cabinet minister from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, told Channel 14 that Tomer-Yerushalmi had “stabbed (soldiers) in the back.”

“In this case, we are talking about treason,” he said. “She was supposed to be the bulletproof vest — the protector — of IDF soldiers.”

Netanyahu himself described the leak as “the most severe propaganda attack in Israel’s history,” warning of the “enormous reputational damage to Israel, to the IDF and to our soldiers.”

Israel now has a delicate tightrope to traverse as internal opponents clash over whether exposing the truth can still be seen as loyalty, rather than treason.

Leak was to ‘counter false propaganda’

The scandal subsided for a while but reared its head again when the IDF announced in October that an investigation was underway. Israel desperately wanted to know who leaked the footage, especially after it made its way across national TV.

Within days, Tomer-Yerushalmi confessed: she had authorised the release herself.

She insisted the decision came from frustration at the political zeitgeist in Israel. She claimed she wanted “to counter the false propaganda” spread by right-wing politicians accusing military prosecutors of turning on their own.

“There are actions which must never be taken even against the vilest of detainees,” she wrote in her resignation letter. “Unfortunately, this basic understanding … no longer convinces everyone.”

She claimed her officers had faced personal attacks and accusations that they “favoured terrorists over our own troops,” simply for insisting that Israeli law applied even in war.

General vanishes after resignation

Then came the twist that stunned everyone.

Within 24 hours of her resignation, Tomer-Yerushalmi vanished.

Her car was discovered at a beach north of Tel Aviv, a note left inside. Police launched a frantic search, deploying helicopters and military patrols.

By nightfall she was found alive on another beach further north. She was without her phone, which police believe she had thrown into the sea.

Hours later, she was in custody — accused of fraud, abuse of office, and leaking classified material. The IDF’s former chief prosecutor, Colonel Matan Solomosh, was also detained.

Both remain under investigation.

The Sde Teiman affair has dialled up Israel’s internal political conversation once again. Supporters of Tomer-Yerushalmi see her as a principled whistleblower trying to prove that Israel can police its own army.

In private meetings, Tomer-Yerushalmi reportedly warned that if Israel failed to investigate itself, “the wave of international legal proceedings” would become unstoppable.

It is an important factor to consider as the International Criminal Court pursues war-crimes charges against Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant.

But according to Israeli media, even she hesitated to open some war-crimes inquiries for fear of provoking Israel’s increasingly hard-line political base.

President Isaac Herzog called for calm as the scandal hit fever pitch.

“Words that spiral out of control ignite a dangerous fire and endanger lives … It is now essential to lower the flames, to show humanity and sensitivity,” he wrote on social media.

The Israel Democracy Institute also chimed in.

“The video leak and the allegations of cover-up and deception cannot serve as an excuse for failing to investigate or prosecute soldiers for violations of IDF orders and the law of armed conflict.”

The ordeal has opened up a can of worms that Israel is desperately trying to contain.

After going global, the story of Tomer-Yerushalmi is less about a single leak and more about whether Israel’s institutions can uphold their own laws under the weight of war and nationalism.