Israeli police said the decommissioned tank was stolen from a military base in northern Israel and found hours later in a nearby dump, marking the second such incident in 2023, AFP and News.ro reported.

Israel’s Defense Ministry alerted police to the “theft of a tank from a training base” on the night of Tuesday to Wednesday near the city of Eliakim, located between Tel Aviv and Haifa.

Police said the search quickly led to the discovery of a “tank in a junkyard near Nesher”, just 20 kilometers from the base on the southern outskirts of Haifa.

An investigation has been opened into the theft.

The second “disappearance” this year

The Israeli army, for its part, announced that the tank found belonged to the Merkava 2 type, “decommissioned many years ago.”

This type of Israeli-made tank was developed in the early 80s.

“The tank was decommissioned and was not ready,” the army said in a statement on Wednesday, adding that it had been placed at a shooting range accessible to tourists.

This is the second time an Israeli decommissioned tank “disappears” under unexplained circumstances this year.

In February, a tank was stolen from a war memorial in Syria’s Golan Heights, annexed by Israel, to be used in a demonstration against the government of Benjamin Netanyahu.

According to local media reports, the person driving the armored vehicle at the time, who said he had a permit, was detained by police because he was not licensed to drive the tank and was taken to where he was abducted.