An Israeli police officer abruptly left Brazil this week after a Brazilian judge ordered an investigation into whether he committed war crimes in Gaza.
Israeli embassy officials helped the soldier, Yuval Vagdani, fly out of the country on Sunday after the order emerged. The criminal complaint was filed by a Belgium-based non-profit group, the Hind Rajab Foundation, which “focuses on legal action against perpetrators, accomplices, and instigators of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Palestine.”
On Wednesday, the Israeli military announced that it would no longer identify soldiers by name to the media, “for fear of arresting soldiers abroad.”
Mr. Vagdani was deployed to Gaza after the Oct. 7, 2023 of Hamas, which led to Israel’s attack on this area in a campaign aimed at defeating and destroying Hamas.
According to the complaint of Hind Rajab Foundation, Mr. Vagdani posted videos and photos on social media from Gaza showing that he destroyed people’s homes and other buildings. The group says those actions were a systematic attempt to impose intolerable living conditions on civilians, in violation of international law. (The Times has not independently verified that testimony.)
A Brazilian judge ruled that the allegations should be investigated, and referred the matter to the federal police. Several similar criminal complaints have been filed against Israeli soldiers who have gone on vacation in recent months, including in Cyprus, Sri Lanka, Argentina and Chile.
Mr. Vagdani, who The Times could not reach for comment, arrived in Israel on Wednesday.
In an interview with Kan, an Israeli public broadcaster, he agreed to send a video of a building being blown up. “That’s what they saw and they want to investigate me,” he said. “They turned it over to one house and made 500 pages, they thought I killed thousands of children and who knows.”
Mr. Vagdani also told Kan that he was at the Nova music festival near the Gaza border on Oct. 7, 2023 and escaped the massacre there.
Israeli officials downplayed the seriousness of the charges, noting that no criminal complaint has led to any arrests. “We understand that part of this situation is driven by pro-Palestinian activists and is based on intelligence,” said Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, a spokesman for the Israeli military.
The open source methods in question are social media, which pro-Palestinian groups are now using as evidence to request criminal charges against soldiers when they travel abroad.
Absolute authority
The combination of social media and international travel – and a very old body of law – could open a new arena in international criminal law.
Universal jurisdiction, one of the oldest principles of international law, holds that certain crimes are so serious that any country in the world can prosecute the perpetrators. In the 18th century, that law was used for crimes such as robbery; in recent times, it has been used in prosecutions for genocide and war crimes.
Israel is relying on international powers to prosecute Adolf Eichmann, a top Nazi official, for crimes against humanity committed during the Holocaust. Spain is relying on it to demand the extradition of Augusto Pinochet, the former dictator of Chile, to face charges of torture and other crimes. And in recent examples, several European countries have relied on the principle of trying Syrian officials for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Belgium has prosecuted Rwandans accused of involvement in the 1994 genocide in its courts.
For decades, those cases were relatively rare, and tended to target high-ranking officials. “There has been this tendency to focus on higher levels to maximize impact, and also because at higher levels sometimes behavior is better documented than at lower levels,” said Yuval Shany, a professor of international law at the Hebrew University. in Jerusalem.
It used to be difficult for a local prosecutor to find evidence of alleged war crimes committed in another country. That changed with social media. “Technology is coming to close the gap, because if you have recorded and recorded yourself committing war crimes, it is very easy to prosecute, even in courts far away from the world,” said Mr. Shany.
Experts say that Israeli soldiers have posted videos and other images of themselves in Gaza saying and doing things that could be interpreted as evidence of serious crimes, including destroying people’s homes and property, and calling for the expulsion or extermination of Palestinians.
While the social media clips can be taken out of context or misinterpreted – and Israel has accused Hamas of using public infrastructure for military purposes – “some of them look very bad,” Mr. “There is this level of accountability that we have not seen before in wars, because it was very difficult to produce evidence.”
However, while social media evidence is compelling, it is unlikely that it will be enough on its own to secure a successful prosecution, said Rebecca Hamilton, a law professor at American University and a former attorney at the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor’s office: “What is posted on social media does not establish a war crime case.”
A new legal strategy
The Hind Rajab Foundation claims to have gathered evidence against about 1,000 Israeli soldiers. It also tracks their foreign travel on social media as they post about their vacations, and immediately files criminal complaints in the countries they visit.
Dyab Abou Jahjah, the chairman of the Hind Rajab Foundation, said that international law enforcement should not be afraid of his organization. “We are not planning a witch hunt for the Israeli army,” he said. “We are filing charges against the soldiers as we have evidence that they are responsible for war crimes.”
Unlike many high-ranking leaders, low-ranking soldiers often do not have political immunity, or the resources to investigate which areas leave them vulnerable to war crimes complaints.
Of course, an NGO filing a criminal complaint is not the same as a prosecutor filing charges, let alone an arrest or conviction.
The Israeli government has taken steps that suggest it is concerned about criminal complaints. The government, which insists that its forces in Gaza operate in accordance with international law, has established an interagency team to assess the legal risks of soldiers and reservists abroad. And the foreign minister recently issued a public warning to Israelis that the things they wrote on social media could be used to take legal action against them in other countries.
These cases may not need to see a court, or result in an arrest, to have an impact. The prospect that soldiers may not be able to travel to other countries without risking prison is one that society may find difficult to tolerate.
Traveling abroad is very important in Israel, said Mr. Shany. “So I think there’s this perception that this is an unacceptable risk, and that the disbanded government forces should be removed.”
Isabel Kershner and Aaron Boxrman contributed reporting from Israel, Ephrat Livni contributed reporting from Washington, DC, and Jack Nicas contributed reporting from Brazil.
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