A decommissioned military tank was stolen from a military base in northern Israel before being found a few hours later in a nearby junkyard, the country's police said Wednesday (September 20th).
The police say they were seized by the Ministry of Defense of the case of a "tank stolen from a training base", in the night, near the city of Elyakim (between Tel Aviv and Haifa). The search quickly found "the tank in a junkyard near Nesher", about twenty kilometers away, in the southern suburbs of Haifa, adds the police. An investigation was opened for theft.
Second disappearance
The IDF said the tank found was a Merkava 2, "decommissioned many years ago." This type of tank, made in Israel, was designed at the turn of the 1980s. "The tank had been disarmed and was not operational," the army said in a statement, adding that it was stationed at a shooting training ground accessible to hikers.
This is the second time an Israeli tank has disappeared in murky conditions this year. In February, a tank was removed from a military memorial in the occupied and annexed Syrian Golan to be staged during an anti-government demonstration. Claiming to have a permit, the person in command of the armored vehicle was arrested by police for lack of tank permit and the tank was returned to its place of origin, according to local press.