On the night of February 27, 2005, a force from Battalion 13 of the Golani Brigade, under the command of Lt. Sulaiman Abbas, detained four Palestinians in the border area between the Gaza Strip and Egypt (“the Philadelphi Corridor”). The Palestinians, who were suspected of trying to infiltrate and smuggle arms, were transferred by Lt. Abbas and his soldiers to the nearby base.
Lt. Abbas began questioning one of the detainees, Sufyan Abu Jazr, about his actions, and while doing so grabbed his shirt and hit him in the nape of the neck. The deputy commander of the battalion, Maj. MD, was present in the room during that time and did not interfere with Lt. Abbas's actions until he left the room. Later Lt. Abbas ordered his subordinates to strip Abu Jazr’s pants off, and even before they had done so he attached a pair of wire cutters to Abu Jazr’s penis (over his pants) and threatened that if he did not answer the questions he would cut his penis. At this point Maj. MD returned to the room and commented that he did not think information could be retrieved from the detainee. Maj. MD put guards on the detainee and exited the room again.
Lt. Abbas was convicted based on his confession as part of a plea bargain to the offenses of exceeding authority and inappropriate behavior. He was sentenced to two months of military labor and a four-month suspended prison term (Staff/46/06. Verdict: March 11, 2007. Sentence: March 27, 2007).
An indictment on charges of inappropriate behavior (Staff/47/06) was at first served against Maj. MD as well for not stopping Lt. Abbas’s actions, even having witnessed some of them, but later the indictment was canceled and commuted to a disciplinary proceeding.
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