The Israeli military cancelled a planned raid on a Palestinian village after one of its soldiers posted details of the operation on Facebook.
The unnamed soldier revealed the time and place of the raid and the name of his unit on the social networking site. He said on his status update that his unit planned a “clean up” raid.
The soldier was court-martialled and sentenced to 10 days in prison. He was also ousted from his battalion and relieved of combat duties.
“On Wednesday we clean up Qatanah, and on Thursday, God willing, we come home,” the soldier wrote on his Facebook page. Qatanah is a village in the West Bank near Ramallah.
His Facebook friends and fellow soldiers reported the post to the authorities.
The decision to cancel the raid was made by commanders after it was feared the leak would put the unit in danger. The operation went ahead several days later.
- BBC News
12 Comments
I think he might be a “Prime Minister” rather than a “Mr President”.
So was the soldier feeling guilty or was he just a dickhead?
Whatever he felt… FAIL. Very funny FAIL.
@SL; Would not have been a funny fail if the this information had found its way in to the hands of their target and resulted in casualties to his unit. Assuming it was accidental, and presumably because it wasn’t too specific in the details – ten days seems fair.
I tend to suspect that anyone who’s dumb enough to announce a raid on Facebook ought not to be in the army, full stop. I mean, really! Did he not think? I’m presuming he wasn’t feeling guilty, he was just a d*ck.
Hey, it was only last year that Britain’s most senior anti-terror police officer almost bungled a series of raids by being photographed carrying the proposal document while getting out of a cab at Downing Street. Failing to consider the possible consequences of your actions seems absurdly common.
And yes Lorenzo, you’re entirely right. My bad.
For some reason the blog has locked me out and I can’t post, only comment. I had a piece ready to put up but it will have to wait until normal service is resumed.
Bibi is the PM not the President.
SL – locked me out too – I had to get a new password.
It could be a new refusenik tactic… rather than land in gaol for a year (I think), join up then stuff up so bad you get a dishonorable discharge.
Sinc & SL – yes, I’ve got a new password too – it’s back to working fine again.
Nag, nag, nag… okay, funnie is now corrected. Am not having a good week – that’s two in a row.
Um, DB, wouldn’t it be easier to just do ambulance corps service for a year?