Khaberni - The Tel Aviv Magistrates' Court extended the arrest of former military prosecutor Yifat Tomer Yerushalmi until next Friday, today, Wednesday.
This extension is the second since her arrest last Monday, on charges of leaking a video documenting a sexual assault by Israeli soldiers on a Palestinian prisoner in the infamous Sde Teman detention facility.
The Israeli Broadcasting Corporation reported that the court approved the extension of Yerushalmi's detention until next Friday.
It noted that the court also agreed to Yerushalmi's request not to appear in person at the extension session, and to hold the session via Zoom.
The Corporation did not provide an explanation for Yerushalmi's request, but she has recently been subjected to a fierce wave of criticism and incitement against her by the Israeli right.
Last Sunday, reports indicated that Yerushalmi had disappeared for hours before being found and arrested; prior to that, she had stated that she resigned because she had agreed to the video leak in August 2024, then the police extended her arrest until Wednesday, and today the arrest was extended again until next Friday.
Recently, both locally and internationally, the scandal of leaking a video that shows 5 soldiers sexually assaulting a Palestinian prisoner from Gaza Strip in Sde Teman camp belonging to the army in southern Israel has gained attention.
Following the leak of the video, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz fired Yerushalmi on Saturday, stripping her of her rank even though she had resigned.
In her resignation letter on Friday, Yerushalmi said that she allowed the release of materials to the media to counter false propaganda against the law enforcement agencies in the army, according to Israeli media.
The Beginning of the Case
The case dates back to July 2024, when Israeli soldiers tortured a Palestinian prisoner from Gaza and assaulted him in the Sde Teman detention facility, leading to severe injuries, a rib fracture, a punctured lung, and a torn rectum.
The footage shows soldiers taking a prisoner aside and gathering around him while holding a dog and shielding their actions with their riot control equipment.
Tomer Yerushalmi said that by her actions, she tried to counteract the negative propaganda against the military's legal administration tasked with upholding the law.
Israeli media, including the Broadcasting Corporation, reported on Monday that Israel released the tortured detainee on October 13 of the previous year to the Gaza Strip, as part of a batch of prisoners in an exchange deal with Hamas, while there has been no comment from the movement or the Palestinian institutions concerned with prisoner affairs.
More than 10,000 Palestinians, including children and women, are currently in Israeli prisons, suffering from torture, starvation, and medical neglect that have resulted in the deaths of many detainees, according to Israeli and Palestinian human rights organizations.
The assaults on Palestinian detainees have escalated in conjunction with a genocidal war waged by Israel with American support on the Gaza Strip over two years since October 8, 2023, which left more than 68,000 Palestinian martyrs and over 170,000 injured, most of whom are children and women.
