Stunned and embarrassed by revelations of new cases of abuse by Israeli border policemen toward Palestinians, the commander of the corps ordered a two-hour halt to operations on Wednesday for lectures to its members emphasising behavioural norms.
Commander David Tzur also convened an emergency meeting of the Border Police high command to discuss the phenomenon within his force of mistreating Palestinians.
The move followed the arrest of 12 border policemen this week who have confessed to abusing Palestinians. Nine of them confessed to beatings and theft of money and mobile phones during searches for Palestinians residing in Israel illegally.
Most of their abuses took place in the Arab-Israeli town of Baka al-Gharbiya, in central Israel on the border with the West Bank.
Three other border policemen were formally charged on Wednesday with abusing two 17-year-old Palestinians from a village near Jerusalem about six weeks ago.
The three confessed to ordering the 17-year-olds into their jeeps and driving them off to a nearby forest, where they were beaten with sticks, punched, had milk poured over them and were forced to kiss the policemen’s boots and chew sand and stones.
Pictures displayed in court on Tuesday, which appeared in the Israeli media, showed that one youth’s back was covered in welts from the beatings.
Meanwhile, another border policeman was convicted on Tuesday of the ”death through negligence” of a Palestinian by shooting the victim even though he posed no threat to the soldier.
The new cases came after four Israeli border policemen were arrested last spring for beating to death an 18-year-old Palestinian in the southern West Bank city of Hebron.
Also, former Israeli soldiers have opened a photo exhibition in Tel Aviv that depicts how they mistreated Palestinians in the occupied territories while on active duty there, often out of boredom, stress and the temptation to abuse their power.
About 200 people attended the opening of the exhibition entitled Breaking the Silence this week, the Israeli Yediot Ahronot daily reported on Wednesday.
One anonymous recording at the exhibition describes how a soldier threw a stun grenade at a group of Palestinian children to break the monotony of his service. The soldier confesses to throwing out a glass so that it would smash. They then reported over the two-way radio that the children threw a bottle at them and used this as an excuse to throw the stun grenade.
”On the day when I realised that I was enjoying the feeling of power, I was ashamed of myself. It’s like playing a computer game. At the touch of your fingers, they obey. It’s a terrific rush. Suddenly I realized that dominating people is addictive,” Yediot quoted him as saying. — Sapa-DPA