(From Washington, United States) – The spokesperson for the State Department, Vedant Patelannounced today that USA confirmed that five units of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) were found responsible “of individual incidents of serious human rights violations”.
Patel clarified that all the violations occurred before the terrorist attack carried out by Hamas on October 7, 2023. According to the investigation of the State Department, the main illegal act occurred in early 2022 and in the West Bank.
“After a careful process We confirm that five Israeli units were responsible for individual incidents that violated human rights. All of these incidents happened before October 7 and none happened in Gaza. Four of these units have effectively remedied these violations,” Patel explained.
The Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, had initiated the administrative investigation to determine – among other complaints – whether the Israeli Netzah Yehuda battalion of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) violated human rights during a military operation carried out in the West Bank in early 2022.
The result of the investigation is a warning signal from the United States to Israel, which is questioned by the number of deaths it caused during its offensive in Gaza to exterminate the terrorist group Hamas, which is responsible for the massacre committed in Israel on October 7, 2023. That day 1,300 Jews were murdered, dozens of women and men were mutilated, and more than one hundred civilians were kidnapped and still remain captive in the Strip.
“I will firmly defend the IDF, our army and our fighters. If anyone believes they can impose sanctions on an IDF unit, “I will fight this with all my powers,” Benjamin Netanyahu warned on the official X account (formerly Twitter), when he learned that the State Department was He was ready to disseminate his research.
And he finished: “It is the height of absurdity.”
Netanyahu joins together with the Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, and the opposition leader Benny Gantz Israel’s War Cabinet. The three have political and tactical differences regarding the conflict against Iran and its proxies, but in this case they reacted en bloc given the imminent publication of Blinken’s report on the battalion Netzah Yehuda.
Following Netanyahu’s critical statements, Gantz contacted the Secretary of State to argue that a sanction against Netzah Yehuda would damage Israel’s legitimacy in time of war and maintain that the Israeli defense forces They act under international laws.
“The commanders and troops of the Netzah Yehuda Battalion are operating on the front lines of the fighting, since the outbreak of the war, they have been working to drive away Hezbollah forces on the northern border, to thwart terrorist elements in Judea and Samaria , and these days they are working to dismantle the Hamas brigades in the Gaza Strip, risking their lives,” he concluded. Yoav GallantMinister of Defense, in line with Netanyahu and Gantz.
Despite the advocacy of the three members of the Israeli War Cabinet, Blinken did not back down in the political decision to inform the public about their research based on the so-called Leahy Law.
In 1997, the Capitol passed a law drafted by Senator Patrick Leahy (Vermont-Democrat) that “prohibits the United States government use funds to assist foreign security force units when credible information exists that implicates that unit in the commission of serious violations of human rights,” explains the official website of the State Department.
So, the Leahy Law allows the State Department – and also the Department of Defense – to open a summary to determine whether a foreign military unit – in this case the Netzah Yehuda battalion – violated human rights in fulfillment of a mission.
The investigation led by Blinken -in compliance with the Leahy Law- could deny funds to finance Israel’s war efforts against Iran and its proxies. almost two weeks ago, the Capitol allocated USD 13,000 million in military aid to Israel, after a debate that fractured the ruling bloc over Netanyahu’s military strategy.
Israel intends to avoid -essentially- that the critical report of the Biden administration aggravates the questions of global public opinion regarding its offensive in Gaza, in addition to block the portion of military funds that should be allocated to the Netzah Yehuda battalion, if it is ultimately sanctioned by the State Department.
The White House has already questioned Prime Minister Netanyahu for the death of the volunteers of the NGO World Central Kitchen, and now the action of the Netzah Yehuda battalion is added, which was in the West Bank and prior to the Hamas terrorist attack.
The Netzah Yehuda battalion was formed as a special unit for ultra-orthodox Jewish soldiers. They are all men and ended up receiving young people with extreme right-wing ideology who were rejected by the other units of the Israel Defense Forces.
Unit “of the young men of the hills” -as they were identified- was deployed in the West Bank, and the State Department began its investigation towards the end of 2022, after receiving continuous complaints about incidents of violence against Palestinian civilians.
In January 2022, he dies a Palestinian of American origin called Omar Assad. He was eighty years old and was arrested by Netzah Yehuda soldiers at a checkpoint in the West Bank. It was already night and Assad refused Israeli control: He was handcuffed, gagged and left out in the open. He died a few hours later.
The autopsy showed that Assad had died of a stress-induced heart attack caused by injuries sustained while in custody. The Israeli military justice system found that there were faults in the conduct of the soldiers involved, who “acted in a way that did not correspond to what is required and expected,” it said in its own ruling.
The Israeli military punished three of the unit’s commanders after the investigation. But no criminal charges were brought against the soldiers. In January 2023, the battalion was moved from the West Bank to the Golan Heights.
During the G7 summit in Capri, Blinken was asked when the results of the investigation into the Netzah Yehuda battalion would be known. The Secretary of State was laconic: “You will be able to see them in the next few days,” advance.
It is the first time that the United States applies the Leahy Law with Israel, which is its main ally in the Middle East. Netanyahu did not want to set a precedent, and during the last conversation he had with Biden he proposed that the release of the report be postponed in time.
Biden said no.
And today the results of the investigation led by Blinken were known. In favor of Israel is that it amended four of the five cases analyzed -as required by the Leahy Law so as not to suspend the military aid granted-, and it remains to be known what sanctions the White House will apply against illegal conduct of the Netzah Yehuda battalion in the West Bank.
