Document Leak Affair • A's friends from the intelligence department to Levi: 'Enough of the harassment!'"

November 20, 2024   

26 reserve officers and non-reserve soldiers from the IDF intelligence unit where the reservist, Sergeant Major A, who was arrested in the 'document leak' affair, serve signed an extraordinary letter today (Wednesday), which was sent to Defense Minister Yisrael Katz and Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi - requesting an end to the discriminatory, rigid and selective treatment of their unit members. The officers and soldiers who serve with the arrested soldier claimed that the claim of a source risk was greatly exaggerated. They accused him of being selectively enforced in his arrest, compared to other cases published in the Israeli media. The soldiers and officers claim that the conduct towards Sergeant A, who is currently in custody, includes strict and exceptional treatment, as if it were a serious threat to state security. They wrote: ”Armed and masked teams were sent to break into his house in the dead of night, as if he were a foreign agent." They also claim in their letter that Sergeant A and other soldiers in the unit were prevented from meeting with lawyers for ten days - a move intended, they say, 'for the last of the spies.' In their letter, the soldiers emphasize that they do not justify Sergeant A’s actions, but they seek to criticize the blow-up of the affair: 'We believe that he could have achieved the desired result - that is, passing relevant information to a political echelon - in a different way and through accepted means, but it is impossible that more sensitive intelligence information was published in the past, and no one was questioned." The signatories to the letter claim that this is selective enforcement and a serious blow to the morale of the unit. ”They are breaking all the rules in this case - on our friend’s back. It is impossible that similar cases in the past were not investigated at all, while here we see dramatic actions that include a nighttime break-in to his home with armed teams and preventing him from meeting with a lawyer for ten days.” The soldiers even accuse that the arrest process is motivated by political considerations: ’There are no answers that put the mind at ease about the claim that releasing him to house arrest will endanger the security of the state. We know A. as a man of values, a true patriot, and a loyal friend. The claim that he is dangerous is simply unfounded.“ The signatories demand that the case be transferred to internal IDF disciplinary proceedings, and that Sergeant Major A. be released to house arrest. "Harm to our friend and his family also affects the morale of the entire unit. We call on you to stop the injustice.’ In the meantime, Reserve Soldier A. has parted ways with lawyer Micha Patman, who represented him up to this point in the case. The defense attorney resigned this morning from representing the suspect, after 3 weeks of dealing with the case. Those around him refused to respond to News 12's question about why he chose to do so. Media person Yinon Magal wrote this evening: "If the letter to the Minister of Defense and the Chief of Staff was not enough, a source in A's intelligence unit who is suspected of passing the document to Feldstein told me in the clearest terms this evening: 'What A' did did not reveal sources or endanger a source. The document itself is defined as intelligence gathering and technical spoils. What revealed that the information also came from sensitive sources or could have come from such sources were the leaks from A's and Feldstein's interrogation rooms. "In contrast, Ilana Dayan's publication on January 4 that the 'Jericho Wall' plan was known to the Intelligence Branch from 2022, in which there was certainly a danger of exposing sources because it was not about collecting intelligence and technical spoils, but about information that came from a sensitive source. And this incident was not investigated," political commentator Amit Segal commented: "This is very interesting. For the first time, a source who knows - 26 officers and soldiers who serve with the detained soldier - states that there is a great exaggeration in the claim of a risk to sources, and that there is selective enforcement in his arrest compared to other cases published in the Israeli media. "It seems that it is no longer possible, especially with such a serious indictment, to rely only on vague promises where this is an exceptional case. The officers here cite a specific example of a more serious case that was not investigated and cast doubt on the seriousness of this case as described. "Sergeant Major A., ​​a reservist, allegedly passed a classified document to the Prime Minister's Office, in which it was alleged that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was using the issue of the abductees to incite demonstrations and division in Israel. As a result, the investigation was opened and the reservist was arrested and interrogated at Shin Bet facilities, along with other implicated individuals, including Eli Feldstein, a military affairs spokesman in the Prime Minister's Office, on suspicion that he "planned to harm the security of the state.".