Police on Tuesday arrested a 21-year-old soldier from northern Israel on suspicion of publishing a Facebook post calling to harm Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the third case of alleged incitement against the premier in less than two months.
The Israel Police cyber crimes division opened an investigation into the matter and the suspect was due to appear at Rishon Lezion Magistrates' Court for a remand hearing.
4 View gallery
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu overseeing a cabinet meeting on Sunday
(Photo: Alex Gamburg)
The suspect, who is a resident of a kibbutz in the western Galilee, wrote on Facebook: "There is a solution and it is bringing down Bibi [Netanyahu]. It already happened in the past that a prime minister was taken down for no just reason [an alleged reference to the murder of Yitzhak Rabin], and now we have a prime minister who is taking down his citizens. It is likely to happen again and rightfully so, and those cops who are his slaves also deserve to be stoned to death. That is the solution."
The soldier also shared other allegedly inciteful material on his Facebook page, among them posts calling for the prime minister and the police to be "burned."
He also shared conspiratorial material on Facebook, including a claim that people were having microchips implanted. Several of his posts have been removed from Facebook.
The arrest came a day after Netanyahu said he had filed a complaint with the police regarding a death threat made against him and his family.
In a post in Hebrew on his Facebook page, Netanyahu said the man threatening him and his family had described how he would carry out his scheme.
The prime minister included a screenshot of a comment that read: "We would march them to Zion Square [in Jerusalem] and chop off their heads then hang their headless bodies from the balcony."
In his first complaint, Netanyahu accused left-wing activist Haim Shadmi of threatening his eldest son, Yair.
Shadmi was seen in a clip posted on social media telling Yair Netanyahu: "One day you will no longer have a personal security detail." In another clip, he was heard advocating hurling a firebomb at the prime minister's residence.
Shadmi and two other activists were grilled by police following the incident but later released without charge.
After the complaint was made, Shadmi posted on social media that he had never intended to use any sort of violence nor would he ever advocate violence against anyone, "even against someone I find so despicable and who is destroying Israeli democracy."