Soldier sentenced to 27 months in jail for leaking secrets, IDF intel

An IDF intelligence soldier was sentenced on Thursday to 27 months in jail as part of a plea bargain by an IDF military court for revealing classified information which could endanger the state. 

The intelligence soldier was also convicted of conduct unbecoming.

Harm to Israeli intelligence and national security

In June 2022, the saga first broke into the news back when concerns were that the harm to Israeli intelligence and national security would be even larger than they eventually turned out to be.

The soldier had been arrested and interrogated by the Shin Bet and the police, along with a variety of other civilians back in March and April 2022.

Those civilians are still facing charges in courts in Lod and Beersheba, but their cases are still at much earlier stages.

According to the indictment, the intelligence soldier leaked a few classified items to non-authorized parties, knowing that they might broadly publicize what he had leaked.

Some of the classified information was later posted online by one of the non-authorized parties.

A statement said that the revelation of the classified information did in fact cause concrete harm to national security, though ultimately the harm was smaller than first expected.

IDF Col. (res.) and public defender lawyer Ran Cohen said that the plea bargain was appropriate, including that charges against the soldier had been reduced in recognition of the fact that he had no intent to try to harm the State of Israel.