All the caves? Yes. It was during Ramadan. A photo was published in the newspaper of a very large tin pot with food spilt on the floor. The entire floor was full of vegetable soup, the entire cave was flooded with a layer of food, two old people standing stunned, and in the background lots of rumpled clothes. They overturned refrigerators, they overturned pots, they overturned everything. [Later,] in the company’s smoking area, the machine gunner said that they opened the house, entered, [he said,] “I felt that the Negev (the machine gun) caught on something, I didn't understand what it was, I gave it a tug, suddenly an enormous pot with lots of food spilled. I really didn't mean to make such a fuss, look what they made of it in the media. All it was was the Negev getting stuck, I gave it a small tug and the stove tipped over. I didn't mean it at all.” They turned everything upside down there. They overturned the closets, they overturned as much as possible. The combatants were very disappointed that there wasn't clearance to enter – there was a school and mosque there – into them there was no clearance to enter. They eventually found some night vision devices and high-end binoculars and some tent poles, pup tents. The assumption was that they (the Palestinians) very quickly hid all the equipment in the mosque and in the school. The large headquarters that they were trying to find for smuggling infiltrators wasn't found, but the village was turned upside down.
Was it in the early morning? No, no, it was in the afternoon. 11:00-12:00 they left, and returned at 4:00-5:00PM, it wasn’t long. The combatants really complained that the orders had been to leave no stone unturned, and they weren't allowed to. [There was] a soldier who raised his hand at the end of the debriefing summary meeting and said: The order was to leave no stone unturned, but you pulled us out after a minute.
How did the command respond to the press coverage? There was a conversation with the battalion commander. Most of his speech was, "Very good, well done," but he [also] said: There are a few newspapers over the past few days that don't really like you. But not to worry, no one actually reads them.
The Haaretz newspaper? Yes.