Citing an agreement made in 2005, Bar Lev stated that female IPS guards will continue to guard security prisoners * Public Security Committee convenes to discuss pimping affair
Public Security Minister Omer Bar Lev has rejected Defense Minister Benny Gantz’s request to implement an immediate ban on the practice of placing female IDF soldiers in the Israeli Prison Services (IPS) to serve as guards for Palestinian security prisoners.
In a letter published on Wednesday morning, Bar Lev responded to Gantz’s request from earlier this week in which he called for an immediate ban on female soldiers guarding Palestinian security prisoners following an additional, sixth testimony from a girl saying that she had been sexually abused by high-security prisoner Muhammed Atallah while serving on the security wing in Gilboa Prison.
In his letter, Gantz demanded that women stop serving in that capacity immediately, pending an in-depth investigation of the allegations.
However, in his response to Gantz, Bar Lev cited a 2005 agreement between the Defense Ministry, the IDF, the IPS, and the Public Security Ministry in which it was decided that the overseeing and guarding of Palestinian security prisoners would be transferred from the IDF to the IPS, and as such, both male and female soldiers in their compulsory service may be transferred from the IDF to the IPS as well.
“In the explanatory notes to the law, it is written that ‘military members who are assigned to the IPS will only engage in tasks related to security prisoners and not to the other prisoners held in the same places,'” wrote Bar Lev.
“Regarding your request that the mandatory soldiers in the IPS be prohibited from staying with the security prisoners, I would like to inform you that the aforementioned soldiers deal exclusively with guarding and escorting the security prisoners…any stay of a mandatory soldier in the security wing is contrary to instructions and will be met with the full severity of the law.
“In light of all that has been said, a change in the designation and in the manner of placing mandatory service soldiers in the IPS requires a change of legislation in the Knesset,” he added.
Continuing, Bar Lev referred to an IDF investigation on the quality of service conditions for soldiers transferred to the IPS, the findings of which were published in a report in May 2022.
“As you probably know, in the final report published by the inspection team in May 2022, it was determined that ‘the team was impressed that all conscripts serving in the IPS are satisfied with their service and even feel pride in the job that they do. Thus, most conscripts expressed willingness to continue serving in the prison on a permanent basis.’
“Later in the report, the committee stated that ‘the conscripts even stated to the inspection team that they are briefed on sexual harassment when they are accepted into the unit.”
In concluding his letter, Bar Lev proposed a “joint dialogue on the subject between the Public Security Ministry and Defense Minister, which will form the basis for the continued safe and fitting service for all conscripted soldiers.
Public Security Committee convenes
On Wednesday afternoon, the Public Security Committee and the Subcommittee on Foreign Affairs and Defense convened to discuss the pimping affair, examining what practical measures could be taken by the Knesset with regard to the affair.
During the committee session, IPS Human Resources head Tami Ezra called the affair “a difficult incident,” and said that she is approaching it “both as a citizen and as the mother of a female soldier who served in the IPS.”
When asked why the IPS has only now started to deal with the sexual assault cases with the assistance of the Center for Victims of Sexual Assault, Ezra explained that only in 2018 after the first cases of the pimping affair came to light were procedures changed.
Attending the committee meeting were various MKs including Otzma Yehudit’s Itamar Ben Gvir, Religious Zionist Party MK Simcha Rothman, and Meretz MK Michal Rozin, among others.
Speaking to the committee, Rozin referred to the Knesset vote held in December of last year, in which a proposal to establish a commission of inquiry into the pimping affair fell 46-41.
“The opposition proposed the establishment of a parliamentary committee of inquiry. We, in the coalition factions, begged in closed rooms for the Public Security Minister and Deputy Minister to let us vote in favor of establishing the committee,” said Rozin. “They flatly refused and we had to compromise and abstain from voting.”
Petition for State Commission of Inquiry
Also on Wednesday morning, the Council of Women’s Organizations in Israel published a petition demanding that a State Commission of Inquiry be established to investigate the pimping affair allegations.
“New and shocking details in the pimping affair of the female guards and the most serious sexual assault allegations are being revealed day after day,” the organization writes. “The horrifying acts require a thorough and serious investigation in all institutions relevant to this case. The Council of Women’s Organizations cannot sit by when such terrible injustices and crimes are committed against young women while they serve the country.”
“We, who represent women and their rights in the country – owe it to the soldiers whose world was destroyed. It is our duty to act immediately to restore the trust of the public, and of women in particular, in the institutions of the State.”