Michael Sfard writes:

The renowned astrophysicist Stephen Hawking discovered that a black hole, the celestial object that swallows everything around it and from which, seemingly, nothing that enters ever escapes, nevertheless emits a certain level of electromagnetic radiation. As is customary in the exact sciences, the phenomenon was named after the scientist who discovered it; in this case, “Hawking radiation.”

Sde Teiman, the Israeli military base-turned-detention facility for Palestinians, which includes a hospital compound for prisoners, has functioned since early on in Israel’s devastating war on Gaza as a moral black hole. All traces of humanity — be it the most basic moral principles, medical ethics, or any remnants of Israeli shame — were swallowed up into it and completely disappeared.

According to testimonies from former detainees and investigations by journalists and human rights organizations, we Israelis starved, tortured, and humiliated Palestinian prisoners there, while providing the wounded and sick with disgraceful medical treatment which, on several occasions, led to amputations that would have been avoidable had the care been reasonable. All values were whirled into the heart of the moral black hole that is the Sde Teiman camp. Was no value at all really saved from it?

Well, it turns out that Sde Teiman, too, has its own Hawking radiation spewing out of it. But just like what disappeared into Sde Teiman, so too the radiation emitted from it is not electromagnetic but ethical: Sde Teiman has radiated the truth about the nature, functioning, and mission of the law enforcement bodies responsible for handling allegations of Israel’s human rights abuses against Palestinians.

Last week, Israel’s top military lawyer dropped all charges against five soldiers from Force 100 who were accused of beating a Palestinian detainee and tearing his rectum by stabbing it with a sharp object — an act that was partially caught on CCTV camera in footage that was later leaked. In doing so, he exposed once and for all the great Israeli lie about the existence of a professional, independent investigative and prosecutorial system seeking substantively to hold rogue soldiers to account. [Continue reading…]