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[Global Network reporter Li Ziyu] According to Axios News, two senior US and Israeli officials revealed that US Secretary of State Blinken spoke with Israeli Defense Minister Galant on the 9th and informed Galant that he had decided to end the investigation into the Israeli Defense Forces' "Yehuda Victory Battalion" for human rights violations in the occupied West Bank and not to impose sanctions on the unit. Earlier, there were reports that the US government was preparing to sanction the unit for violating the human rights of Palestinians in the West Bank.

The report mentioned that in recent months, Galant had secret talks with Blinken and other senior US officials, trying to show that the IDF had taken steps to deal with human rights violations by members of the Yehuda Victory Battalion. The report added that if sanctions were imposed on the Yehuda Victory Battalion, it would be an unprecedented move by the Biden administration and could damage US-Israel relations.

The report said a senior US official said that although Blinken determined that the battalion had committed serious human rights violations, information provided by Israel in the past three months showed that the IDF had corrected the battalion's behavior and addressed US concerns. US officials said the IDF provided the US with evidence that the two soldiers involved in the most serious incidents in the investigation had been relieved of combat missions and would not be called up for reserve service. The US official added that the IDF had indicated to the US that it had taken additional measures against the unit to avoid such incidents, including changing the review process for soldiers who wanted to join the unit and holding a two-week seminar on human rights violations specifically for the unit.

According to the report, Matthew Miller, a spokesman for the US State Department, said, "As we announced in April, after careful review, the State Department found that serious human rights violations by two IDF units and two civilian units had been effectively corrected." "In the past few months, the US State Department has continued to review another unit to assess new information provided by the Israeli government. After a thorough review of this information, we determined that the unit's violations had been effectively corrected." Miller added that "this unit can continue to receive US security assistance."

Axios News Network quoted Israel's Haaretz as saying that the US State Department began investigating the camp at the end of 2022 after soldiers from the Yehuda Victory Camp were involved in a number of violent incidents against Palestinian civilians.

According to a previous report by Xinhua News Agency, the "Yehuda Victory Camp" is an all-male infantry battalion composed of Israeli ultra-Orthodox Jews and religious nationalists. It was previously stationed in the West Bank for a long time. Although its number is not high among the local Israeli garrisons, it has repeatedly been exposed for violating the human rights of the Palestinian people. The most well-known recent incident occurred in 2022, when Omar Assad, an octogenarian with dual American and Palestinian citizenship, died tragically at a checkpoint in the "Yehuda Victory Camp", which aroused strong dissatisfaction from the United States. In response to the concerns of the United States, the Israeli army launched an investigation, but only punished three officers and did not require anyone to bear criminal responsibility.

According to reports from Axios News and other media on April 20, the US government is preparing to impose sanctions on the "Yehuda Victory Battalion" under the Israel Defense Forces on the grounds of violating the human rights of Palestinians in the West Bank. The Associated Press said that if officially announced, this would be the first time the US government has sanctioned Israeli forces, and the battalion and its members would be prohibited from receiving any form of US military assistance or training. After the news was exposed, people from different political factions in Israel voiced their opposition, believing that this would further exacerbate tensions between the US and Israel. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu criticized the sanctions on the Israeli army as "ridiculous" and said he would do his best to prevent this from happening. Some analysts believe that the United States is hypocritical in pretending to try to prevent the escalation of the situation in the Middle East while continuing to promote military assistance to Israel.