A former Israeli soldier who posted on Facebook pictures of herself with blindfolded and handcuffed Palestinian prisoners appeared mystified on Tuesday by the uproar. "What's wrong with that? I don't understand," Eden Abergil told Israel's army radio, clearly bemused by the fierce backlash which erupted two weeks after she posted an album of pictures entitled: "The army - the best time of my life."
"There was no violence in the pictures, there was no disrespect," she said defiantly, insisting she had been caught on camera with the Palestinians merely "in the background." Two pictures show Abergil posing alongside blindfolded and cuffed prisoners at an unspecified location which the former soldier, aged around 20, said was near Gaza. The incident drew a sharp response from the military.