Force 100 (Israel)

Force 100 is a reserve intervention unit within the Israel Defense Forces' Military Police Corps for high-risk incidents involving security detainees and terror suspects. The name was first used by a unit created during First Intifada-era prison unrest, discontinued in 2006, and revived after October 7 as overcrowding at Sde Teiman created demand for a specialized response force.[1][2] Reporting based on reservist interviews describes the current unit as about 50 members in three teams, while mako reported that the Operations Directorate allocated several dozen reservists and several officers.[1][2]

Force 100 was established as a special unit of the Israel Defense Forces' Military Police Corps in the 1990s. Mako and Ynet place its founding in the early 1990s.[1][2] Maariv instead places its formation in the late 1990s at the military prison in Megiddo, describing it as a local initiative of the prison commander.[3] Across the reports, its core function was responding to serious disturbances and other extreme incidents in military detention facilities as the First Intifada produced a sharp rise in the number of Palestinian security prisoners and detainees.[2][3]

The unit's original mission covered riots, hostage-taking, attempted escapes by dangerous prisoners, and other extreme events in detention compounds.[2] Its training was correspondingly intensive: the original Force 100 used a rigorous screening process and approximately six months of counterterrorism training covering hostage scenarios, violent riots, escape attempts, infantry combat, and hand-to-hand fighting.[2] Shmuel Elbaz, a former commander of Megiddo Prison when it was a military installation, recalled that Force 100 personnel were integrated into the prison's regular staffing. Prisoner counts would not begin without the unit nearby, and its equipment included a gas launcher, stun grenades, weapons, helmets, batons, and pistols.[4]

The unit was disbanded in 2006 as responsibility for security prisoners was transferred from the military to the Israel Prison Service, eliminating much of the operational need that had justified its existence.[1][2]

The Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023 produced a rapid and large-scale influx of Palestinian detainees into IDF custody.[1][2] Sde Teiman, a military base in the Negev, was declared a detention facility under the Detention of Unlawful Combatants Law on October 8, 2023. It was intended as a temporary reception, interrogation, and preliminary-screening site for prisoners captured during the war before their transfer to the Israel Prison Service or release to Gaza.[5] As the facility became overcrowded, the IDF reactivated the Force 100 name and established a reservist unit to support security operations there.[1][2]

The IDF's Operations Directorate allocated several dozen reservists and several officers, including a major who commanded the unit. They were drawn from veterans of the original Force 100 and former combat soldiers, while some recruits joined through informal referral.[2] The reactivated force differed significantly from its predecessor in training length: the original unit underwent approximately six months of counterterrorism training, while the post-October 7 reservist force completed a course described as a few weeks by mako and as an intensive month by Ynet's interviewed reservists, followed by continuing instruction.[2][4]

The composition of the detainee population at Sde Teiman changed over time. Highly dangerous detainees were eventually transferred to regular secured military prisons, while many people later held at the facility had been detained in Gaza by the Shin Bet and Unit 504 for further questioning. Mako reported that many were subsequently released after questioning found no connection to Hamas or other terrorist organizations.[2]

Interviews conducted by Ynet with five reservists, identified by pseudonyms in published reporting, described the reactivated unit as comprising approximately 50 members organized into three teams.[1][4] Each team included fighters alongside specialists: a medic, a canine handler, an Arabic speaker, and marksmen. The membership included Jews, Druze, and Muslims.[4] Candidates were drawn from combat-unit reservists, preferably with special-forces backgrounds, and the unit was expected to be available around the clock, stationed approximately a seven-minute drive from Sde Teiman.[1]

Reservists described Force 100 as an intervention force for extreme incidents in detention compounds rather than a routine guard force. Its reported missions included disturbances, mass escape attempts, hostage situations, and other dangerous events that ordinary Military Police detention guards, who primarily patrolled between cells, were not trained or equipped to handle.[1][4] The unit's reported duties also included targeted searches, protecting facility personnel, and preventing smuggling.[2]

Equipment described by reservists included shields, stun grenades, tear gas, batons, tasers, muzzled dogs, and firearms; unit members wore masks to prevent detainees from identifying them.[1][4] The interviewees said they were instructed to use force only in response to real danger and to a reasonable and proportionate degree, in accordance with applicable regulations and law.[4] One published account described an incident in which a Nukhba detainee allegedly behaved violently and sexually toward a female detention soldier. The interviewees said Force 100 entered the compound, restrained and searched the detainee, and warned him against repeating the conduct, while Ynet reported that the soldier's testimony had not yet been taken.[4]

Force 100's significance lies in providing a specialized capability between routine detention guarding and full-scale military response. In reservist accounts, ordinary Military Police soldiers mainly patrolled detention compounds, while Force 100 prepared for mass escapes, hostage situations, violent disturbances, and dangerous searches. Its revival reflected the strain that the post-October 7 detainee influx placed on existing military detention arrangements.[1][4]

Force 100 became the subject of serious legal scrutiny in connection with events at Sde Teiman during the summer of 2024. On July 29, 2024, the IDF began investigating nine Force 100 reservists, including the unit commander, on suspicion of abusing a Hamas detainee; mako noted that the allegation had not been confirmed by the IDF at the time.[2] The investigation and arrests became politically contentious and prompted protests and break-ins at Sde Teiman and the Beit Lid military base.[2][4] Mako reported that at least ten Force 100 reservists, including a captain, participated in the disturbances and that the IDF planned to examine the unit's recruitment, training, and procedures.[2]

In February 2025, military prosecutors indicted five Force 100 reservists in connection with an alleged incident on July 5, 2024. The indictment, as reported by mako, alleged that the five kicked, stomped on, struck, and dragged a handcuffed, leg-cuffed, and blindfolded Palestinian detainee during a search lasting approximately 15 minutes. It further alleged that one soldier stabbed him with a sharp object near the anus.[6] The reported injuries included seven fractured ribs, a punctured left lung, and a rectal tear, and the detainee underwent intestinal surgery.[6] The charges were aggravated serious bodily harm and aggravated abuse. The indictment also described soldiers using their bodies and plastic riot shields to screen the search area.[6] Evidence discussed during the proceedings included medical documents and security-camera footage.[7] These were allegations in an indictment, not judicial findings of guilt.

A Congressional Research Service report noted that in 2024 the U.S. State Department assessed there were credible reports of abuse involving Force 100 and Force 504 at Sde Teiman, but that Secretary of State Antony Blinken did not determine that either unit was ineligible for U.S. military assistance.[8] The CRS report also recorded that an Israeli military court convicted a separate reservist in February 2025 of abusing Palestinian security detainees; that individual was not identified in the CRS account as a member of Force 100.[8]

On September 18, 2024, Israel's High Court of Justice ruled on petitions challenging conditions at Sde Teiman more broadly. The court declined to order the facility closed but held that its continued operation depended on compliance with the Detention of Unlawful Combatants Law and applicable regulations. Petitioners had alleged inadequate food and medical care, physical punishment, and detainees being fed while blindfolded and handcuffed. The court did not resolve those factual allegations, noting that conditions had changed and that specific claims could be addressed through criminal investigations and other review mechanisms.[5]

On March 12, 2026, Military Advocate General Maj. Gen. Itai Ofir ordered the indictment against the five reservists canceled.[9] An IDF Spokesperson's statement cited several grounds: the complexity of the available evidentiary basis; the release of the Palestinian detainee to Gaza in October 2025 and the evidentiary consequences of that release; conduct by senior officials within the Military Advocate General's Office and the IDF law-enforcement system; and a procedural difficulty in transferring material from a parallel police investigation.[7][9] The military prosecutor acknowledged that security footage did not clearly establish the charged conduct and that the detainee's testimony would have been important to the case.[7] The cancellation terminated that prosecution entirely; it was not a court finding that the alleged conduct had or had not taken place.[7][9]

In April 2026, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir approved the five reservists' return to active reserve duty following the withdrawal of the indictments, and some had returned to the front.[10] An IDF Spokesperson stated that a command inquiry into the Force 100 soldiers had not yet been conducted after the legal proceedings were canceled, but that the pending military probe did not prevent their reinstatement.[10]

Several aspects of the Force 100 record rest on contested or incomplete information. Mako and Ynet describe the original unit as having been established in the early 1990s, while Maariv places its formation in the late 1990s.[2][3] Descriptions of the reactivated force's training length also vary between a few weeks and a full month.[2][4] Operational accounts of Force 100's conduct are drawn primarily from interviews with unit members, rather than independently published directives or completed official investigations. Those accounts present the unit's mandate as lawful intervention and characterize its authorized use of force as proportionate, but they are not independently verified findings.[1][4]

Published counts of the July 2024 arrests differ. The Times of Israel's timeline reported nine arrests at Sde Teiman on July 29 and a tenth suspect arrested at home the next day.[11] JNS later described the five indicted reservists as having been indicted out of nine soldiers originally arrested.[10] The allegations at the center of the indictment, including the injuries attributed to the July 5, 2024 incident, were serious and publicly documented. The subsequent cancellation of the charges on evidentiary and procedural grounds means that no court adjudicated the underlying facts. Whether misconduct occurred, and to what extent institutional factors at Sde Teiman contributed to the circumstances surrounding the allegations, remains unresolved.