The Israel Defense Forces announced Saturday it launched a criminal probe into one of its soldiers who in a viral video called for a mutiny if the government backs down from a “complete victory” against Hamas.
In the footage, a masked reservist addresses Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from what appears to be a wrecked building in Gaza, backing the hawkish Israeli leader and declaring he and his fellow soldiers refuse to “hand the keys over” to the Palestinians or other Arab groups.
“We reservist soldiers do not intend to hand the keys over to any Palestinian authority. We do not intend to give the keys to Gaza to any entity — Hamas, Fatah or any other Arab entity,” he said in the video, which was shared by Netanyahu’s son Yair, who lives in Miami and has not taken part in the war, according to Israeli media.
“Reservist soldiers are behind you and we want to win,” the soldier says in the video.
The mutinous fighter also tore into Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who in recent weeks has clashed with Netanyahu over plans for governing Gaza after the war with Hamas, and demanded the war cabinet member step down.
Earlier this month, Gallant publicly called on Netanyahu to make “tough decisions” on the post-war governance of Gaza that did not involve Hamas, and warned he did not support any Israeli involvement in managing the enclave after the fighting ended.
“Yoav Gallant, you can’t win the war. Quit!,” the bombastic soldier said in the video. “You can’t command us!”
The soldier claimed he would refuse any of Gallant’s orders, promising that if the government did not pursue eliminating Hamas, he and the 100,000 reservist soldiers called up to fight the war would station themselves on the border of the embattled enclave — where they would call on Israeli citizens to join them.
“Our brothers and sisters did not die for nothing, weren’t raped for nothing, and were not slaughtered in their beds for nothing,” he said, referring to IDF soldiers who have been killed during the ongoing war in Gaza and the horrors of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
The Israeli military told The Times of Israel it had launched an investigation into the footage and that IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi had ordered all commanders to speak with their troops about the issue.
“The behavior in the video is a serious violation of IDF orders and IDF values, and constitutes a suspicion of criminal offenses,” a military spokesperson told the outlet.
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid wrote on X that footage calling for a rebellion within the military is “dangerous and disastrous.”
Lapid slammed Netanyahu supporters who “enthusiastically” shared the video as evidence of “another attempt to escape responsibility for the one who led to the biggest disaster in the history of the Jewish people since the Holocaust.”
In other developments:
With Post wires