Givati Mutiny: Four More Soldiers Jailed and Dismissed from Combat Duty

The trials of the soldiers of the Tzabar Battalion of the Givati Brigade, who last Thursday abandoned the Sde Teiman base while chanting slogans against officers, have concluded. Four additional soldiers were sent to prison and dismissed from combat duty, one of whom was sentenced while on pre-discharge leave.

The Givati Brigade commander, Colonel Netanel Shamka, had already sentenced 14 of the soldiers who led the incident to 30 days in prison the day after the event and dismissed them from combat service. About 80 other soldiers who left the base and returned to it received significant leniency and on Saturday, together with their commanders, underwent a "command and educational process to strengthen the discipline, values, and norms expected of IDF soldiers."

The incident began on Thursday afternoon, when veteran soldiers abandoned the base in protest against their commanders who had removed signs and symbols they had hung. Officers from the brigade attempted to locate and return the soldiers. The videos published from the scene received wide resonance on the X network and were used by Arabic accounts to celebrate the mutiny within the IDF.

The battalion commander, who was said to have broken and smashed the symbols, published a message to the soldiers' parents:

"Those of you who are familiar from your military service with the seniority games between young and veteran soldiers know how serious the incident is. Therefore, I decided to break wooden signs of a devil, the angel of death, and others, signs that represent exactly these things. I decided to remove the rest of the signs from the companies, except for a few, out of an understanding of their sentimental value. It is important to note, there is no connection between the signs and the battalion's fallen soldiers or memorial corners, contrary to what was claimed in some of the media."

He added: "Many of the soldiers who decided to leave their weapons and leave the base and become AWOL did so out of negative social pressure and not out of judgment. Therefore, in order to help many of them 'get off the tree,' I decided to give them until 16:00 to return to the base. Whoever arrives, we will know how to contain him. Whoever decides not to arrive will have to answer for it."

On the other hand, the soldiers who abandoned the base claimed that the signs they had prepared were smashed by commanders using a hammer. The soldiers further said that these were symbols that had been with them during the fighting in Gaza and Lebanon, and they are a tradition in the battalion — passed from cycle to cycle. In an official statement, the soldiers claimed:

"When these symbols are broken, you are not just breaking a piece of wood or a sign — you are breaking something of the spirit of the fighters. After everything we have been through, the very small thing that gives us strength, pride, and a smile was destroyed. Unfortunately, this is only a small part of the attitude and conduct that we experience from some of the officers towards the fighters. We cannot continue to be silent."