Former commanders of the Netzah Yehuda battalion, an Israeli military unit that has been accused by the United States of gross human rights violations against Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank prior to October 7, have been promoted to senior positions in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and are now active in training Israeli ground troops as well as running operations in Gaza, a CNN investigation has found.
Among CNN’s findings was rare whistleblower testimony from a former soldier of the unit who described a command that encouraged a culture of violence, an issue identified by US State Department investigations.
In April, the State Department said that it had determined five Israeli security units had committed gross violations of human rights prior to the outbreak of the war with Hamas in Gaza. The department said that four of the units had “effectively remediated,” or reformed themselves, in the wake of those violations, but that it was still deciding whether to restrict US military assistance to the remaining unit: The Netzah Yehuda battalion, originally created to accommodate ultra-Orthodox Jews in the military.
In this 2014 photo, Israeli soldiers in the Netzah Yehuda battalion are seen taking part in training in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, near the Syrian border.
Menahem Kahana/AFP/Getty Images/File
The news that the US might withhold assistance from the Israeli military unit triggered a furious response at the time from top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said: “If anyone thinks they can impose sanctions on a unit of the IDF, I will fight with all my strength.”
In a letter obtained by CNN, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told House Speaker Mike Johnson that the US was working with Israel “on identifying a path to effective remediation” for the Netzah Yehuda battalion. The letter did not name the unit, but current and former US officials confirmed to CNN that Blinken was referring to Netzah Yehuda, which has been accused of a string of abuses in the occupied West Bank over the last 10 years, including in the death of a 78-year-old Palestinian-American man in 2022.
Using facial recognition technology and other open-source techniques, CNN has found that three former commanders of the Netzah Yehuda battalion – who were in charge of the unit at the time of alleged abuses in the West Bank – have risen through the ranks of the IDF. CNN tracked these commanders by matching their faces to publicly available imagery over the years, ranging from photographs of military ceremonies to battlefield updates.
CNN has spoken with a former member of the unit, who detailed instances of cruel and excessively violent treatment of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. The whistleblower said that commanders actively supported vigilante violence and that promoting them into senior IDF positions risked bringing the same culture to other parts of the military.
“A lot of us probably did not see Arabs, Palestinians in particular, as someone with rights – okay, like they’re really the occupier of some of the land and they need to be moved,” he said.
The former soldier, who asked not to be named due to fears about his security, told CNN that the unit was well known for carrying out what he described as the “collective punishment of Palestinians.” He gave an example of the battalion’s forces assaulting a Palestinian village, going door-to-door with stun grenades and gas grenades as retribution for some local children throwing rocks.
While he was in Netzah Yehuda, he said, the battalion’s commanders played a key role in perpetuating a culture of violence, both by standing by as it happened and promoting it.
Responding to CNN’s request for comment on the allegations of abuse by Netzah Yehuda, the IDF said that the battalion “operates in a professional and ethical manner” and that its soldiers and commanders “act according to the orders and protocols expected of soldiers in the IDF.” The IDF added that it investigates “every exceptional incident,” and takes command and disciplinary measures against those involved when appropriate. It did not comment on the subsequent promotion of some commanders.
In the course of its month-long investigation, CNN spoke with several current and former US officials, who revealed the intense frustrations within the Biden administration at the perceived special treatment that Israel receives from the US when it comes to addressing human rights violations by its security forces. The former US officials said the fact that Netzah Yehuda’s former commanders have continued to be promoted through Israel’s military ranks was a worrying result of America’s inaction and could have devastating consequences.
The US determined that four of the five Israeli units under scrutiny were remediated on the basis that Israel had taken steps to “bring to justice” responsible service members, according to an internal memo sent by the State Department to Congress and obtained by CNN. Israeli military veterans from Breaking the Silence, an anti-occupation advocacy group, told CNN that the IDF often scapegoats junior soldiers or officers, arguing that abuses are the fault of a few bad apples rather than reflective of institutional problems stemming from longstanding military practices or government policies. That approach should not meet the bar for effective remediation, US officials said.
A State Department spokesperson told CNN that they do not discuss the circumstances of individual cases, but its experts had “concluded that several Israeli security force units were credibly implicated in gross violations of human rights (GVHRs),” and that for four of those, the Israeli government had “taken effective steps to bring those responsible to justice.”
