The IDF has launched an investigation into claims that soldiers and settlers carried out a ruthless assault on three Palestinians days after the Hamas massacre

A group of Israeli soldiers and settlers allegedly carried out a ruthless assault on three Palestinians in the central West Bank last week, days after the Hamas terror group’s October 7 onslaught in southern Israel

The reported victims told Haaretz that they were abused for hours on October 12, when they were beaten, stripped to their underwear, bound and photographed. Two of them were urinated on, one had cigarettes put out on his body and another was sexually assaulted by an assailant who tried to sodomize him, according to their testimony.

The IDF said military police opened an investigation into the incident and that the commanding officer was removed from his post.

The incident was part of a broader rise in violence across the West Bank since the outbreak of the Gaza war.

The altercation occurred in the small Palestinian hamlet of Wadi al-Seeq, 16kms east of Ramallah, which was largely evacuated in recent weeks following an increase in settler attacks on the shepherding community.

A pair of Palestinian activists from Ramallah,  Muhammad Mattar and Muhmmad Khaled, and a Wadi al-Seeq resident identified only as Majed were abducted by the Israelis and allegedly abused for about six hours.

One of the assailants photographed the Palestinians and uploaded the picture to an ultra-nationalist Facebook group.

Civil Administration soldiers who later arrived at the scene released the three Palestinians.

Cigarette burns, beatings, attempted sexual assault: settlers and soldiers abused Palestinians