Israeli Prison
  • Front page
  • Home
  • Palestinians
    • Palestinians july 2020 >
      • Palestinians june 2020
      • Palestinians may 2020
      • Palestinians apr 2020
      • Palestinians mar 2020
      • Palestinians feb 2020
      • Palestinians jan 2020
  • Killed in prison
    • Killed in Prison 2012 >
      • Pictures Killed in prison
  • Israeli Court
    • Israeli Court 2019 >
      • Israeli Court 2018
      • Israeli Court 2017
      • Israeli Court 2016
      • Israeli Court 2015
      • Israeli Court 2014
      • Israeli Court 2013
      • Israeli Court 2012
      • Israeli Court 2011
      • Israeli Court 2009
  • Children
    • Children 2019 >
      • Children 2018
      • Children 2017
      • Children 2016
      • Children 2015
      • Children 2014
      • Children 2013
      • Women
  • Israelis
    • Israelis 2019 >
      • Israelis 2018
      • Israelis 2017
      • Israelis 2016
      • Israelis 2015
      • Israelis 2014
      • Israelis 2013
      • Israelis 2012
      • Israelis 2011
      • Israelis 2010
      • Israelis 2007
  • All Guilty!
  • Palestinian cases
  • No Justice for Murder in Cold Blood
  • Israeli Migrants and asylum seekers
    • Israeli Migrants and asylum seekers 2019 >
      • Israeli Migrants and asylum seekers 2015
      • Israeli Migrants and asylum seekers 2014
      • Israeli Migrants and asylum seekers 2013
  • Lieberman Trail
  • Shimon Peres
  • Netanyahu
  • Moshe Katsav
  • Eduh Barak
  • Ariel Sharon and sons
  • Olmert case
    • Olmert 2015
  • Pre-Oslo release
  • Pre-Oslo prisoners
  • Prisoners Swap
  • Palestinians 2019
    • Palestinians nov 2019
    • Palestinians oct 2019
    • Palestinians sept 2019
    • Palestinians aug 2019
    • Palestinians july 2019
    • Palestinians june 2019
    • Palestinians may 2019
    • Palestinians apr 2019
    • Palestinians mar 2019
    • Palestinians feb 2019
    • Palestinians jan 2019
  • Palestinians 2018
    • Palestinians nov 2018
    • Palestinians oct 2018
    • Palestinians sept 2018
    • Palestinians aug 2018
    • Palestinians july 2018
    • Palestinians june 2018
    • Palestinians may 2018
    • Palestinians apr 2018
    • Palestinians mar 2018
    • Palestinians feb 2018
    • Palestinians jan 2018
  • Palestinians 2017
    • Palestinians nov 2017
    • Palestinians oct 2017
    • Palestinians sept 2017
    • Palestinians aug 2017
    • Palestinians july 2017
    • Palestinians june 2017
    • Palestinians may 2017
    • Palestinians april 2017
    • Palestinians mar 2017
    • Palestinians feb 2017
    • Palestinians jan 2017
  • Palestinians 2016
    • Palestinians nov 2016
    • Palestinians oct 2016
    • Palestinians sept 2016
    • Palestinians aug 2016
    • Palestinians july 2016
    • Palestinians june 2016
    • Palestinians may 2016
    • Palestinians apr 2016
    • Palestinians mar 2016
    • Palestinians feb 2016
    • Palestinians jan 2016
  • Palestinians 2015
    • Palestinians nov 2015
    • Palestinians oct 2015
    • Palestinians sept 2015
    • Palestinians aug 2015
    • Palestinians july 2015
    • Palestinians june 2015
    • Palestinians may 2015
    • Palestinians apr 2015
    • Palestinians mar 2015
    • Palestinians feb 2015
    • Palestinians jan 2015
  • Palestinians 2014
    • 2014 nov
    • 2014 oct
    • 2014 sept
    • 2014 aug
    • 2014 july
    • 2014 june
    • 2014 may
    • 2014 apr
    • 2014 mar
    • 2014 feb
    • 2014 jan
  • Palestinians 2013
    • 2013 nov
    • 2013 oct
    • 2013 sept
    • 2013 aug
    • 2013 july
    • 2013 june
    • 2013 may
    • 2013 apr
    • 2013 march
    • 2013 feb
    • 2013 jan
  • Palestinians 2012
    • 2012 nov
13 feb 2019
Police solve 25-year-old rape and murder of young woman near Beit Shemesh
Picture
Valeri Sakowitz and Vardit Bakraknot

After two and a half decades and three suspects, police finally name the man they believe raped and killed 27-year-old Vardit Bakraknot, whose body was found in a forest near Beit Shemesh in 1993.

Israel Police on Wednesday said they have arrested the man they believe was behind the brutal attack on 27-year-old Vardit Bakraknot, whose body was found names in the woods near the city of Beit Shemesh in 1993.

Police last week arrested 64-year-old Valeri Sakowitz for the rape and murder of the young woman after DNA from the suspect matched biological evidence found at the scene 25 years ago.

Sakowitz was arrested a week and a half ago. The Jerusalem District Court extended his remand for ten more days, after he placed himself at the murder scene.

A combination of police findings and technological developments have faciliated a breakthrough in this case," said Judge David Gabbay Richter. "As a such, it can be said that there is a high level of reasonable suspicion" against Sakowitz.

Sakowitz was born in Belarus when it was still part of the Soviet Union and arrived in Israel in 1990. He lived in Israel until 1994, when he returned to his native country. He went back to Israel a year later, but departed once again, to finally return in 2018.

The suspect, a divorced father of two, initially said he was alone in Israel but later changed his story. He was then arrested and placed in solitary confinement. He testified to being at the murder scene while he was on his way to visit his girlfriend, but denied all other allegations.

Bakraknot, a resident of Kibbutz Kiryat Anavim, located a few kilometers west of Jerusalem, was a photography student. She went missing in November 1993 and her body was found two days later in the Eshtaol Forest bearing signs of violence and rape. She was last seen getting into a Subaru Legacy sedan as she hitchhiked in Tel Aviv, and it is believed the man who drove the car is the one who killed her.
 
Two men were arrested and released after the murder, including an IAF reservist pilot who was cleared by a polygraph test. The other suspect was a salesman who served in the IDF with Bakraknot.

A third man, a serial sex offender, was also arrested and released three months after the event. Two years later, the victim's parents claimed two men were behind the murder and not one, but the mystery remained unsolved.


Other kibbutz members said the victim's father continued to search for the man who killed his daughter until the day he died in 2010.

"I don’t know if I should be happy," Vardit's mother Ra'aya Bakraknot told Ynet last week. "Many theories ended up in nothing over the years and I've often been disappointed. I can't be happy. I hope this time it's him."
 
This new development comes less than a week after another young woman, Ori Ansbacher, was raped and murdered in the Jerusalem area. The suspect Arafat Irfayia, a 29-year-old resident of Hebron in the West Bank was arrested by the IDF on Saturday and is believed to be affiliated with the Hamas terror group.

6 feb 2019
IDF seeks plea deal with soldiers accused of beating detained Palestinians
Picture
Out of fear a trial might become highly politicized ahead of the April elections, Israeli military aims for a plea agreement with five soldiers from the religious Netzah Yehuda battalion, who violently abused Palestinians suspected of aiding their comrades' killer.

The Israeli military is seeking to reach a plea deal with the five soldiers from the IDF's religious battalion Netzah Yehuda, indicted last week for severely beating two Palestinian detainees, out of fear that a trial in a military court ahead of the April elections will become politicized affecting the court's proceedings. IDF also fears that a trial will negatively impact the soldiers and their families, as well as other conscripts from the national-religious and national-ultra-Orthodox communities. 

The incident took place earlier this month during a manhunt for As'am Barghouti, who shot dead two soldiers from the Netzah Yehuda Battalion at the Giv'at Asaf outpost in the West Bank in December. The two Palestinians were arrested on suspicion they helped Barghouti and his brother—who were also involved in a terror attack near Ofra Junction that left seven people wounded—evade capture. The two detainees were severely beaten while being transported by the Netzah Yehuda troops, leaving them with fractured ribs and noses.

The IDF in general and the Military Advocate General's Office in particular, believe lessons have to be learned from the highly publicized trial of Sgt. Elor Azaria that sparked a public and political outcry after he had been tried in a military court for shooting an unarmed Palestinian terrorist who had already been neutralized.

The fact that the trial is due to take place in the midst of election campaigns could politicize this issue to the point that the IDF loses control of the situation. For instance, during the Azaria trial—that was held nowhere near an election campaign—the influx of right-wing politicians that visited the court was enormous.
 
The fact that the five soldiers are represented this time by military defense attorneys is supposed to assist in the task of reaching a plea agreement, which will most likely include months-long prison sentence. In the meantime, the army's pressure to avoid a trial is supposed to make it easier for the accused to negotiate during the three mediation talks—the first out of which is due to be held next week with another two a week later.  

A three-judge panel has already been set up for the trial, headed by the president of Jaffa Military Court, Lt. Col. Carmel Wahabi, who was on the judges’ panel that unanimously convicted Azaria of manslaughter.
 
One of the officers in the troubled battalion testified to the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division, saying that he didn’t prepare the soldiers for the mental difficulties of transporting those involved in their killing their comrades-in-arms. “We deserved to participate in the arrest operation of those involved in the terrorist attack in which the two Netzah Yehuda soldiers were killed. It was a way to get closure, not a way to get revenge,” said the officer.
 
"If we knew that the murderer As'am Barghouti was going to be arrested that night, we would have mentally prepared and things would have looked different,” added the officer. “The arrested soldiers are really good and valuable fighters. They are not aggressive. What happened to them does not show their true character because they found themselves in an emotionally stressful situation following the death of their comrades."

Another officer in the battalion emphasized that the indicted soldiers saw the bodies of their comrades after the shooting and did not receive the needed psychological treatment afterwards. "This is an influential factor; the battalion experienced trauma of war. This issue should be approached in a sensitive manner,” he said.
 
“The five soldiers were charged with aggravated abuse and aggravated battery. The soldiers allegedly cursed, slapped, punched and hit the suspects with fists and blunt objects, targeting their heads as well as other body parts, while the two Palestinians were tied up and blindfolded. The soldiers also allegedly kicked the suspects in the groin and pulled their hair,” said the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit in a statement.
 
"This indictment should not have been filed to begin with, and we are confident that by the end of the trial all the details will be clarified and things will look differently," said the military defense attorney representing the soldiers.
 
“These are outstanding soldiers, whose comrades were killed just a month prior, forced into a situation in which they had to carry out the arrests of those who murdered their comrades (sic) … the aspects related to their mental health should be taken into consideration.”

1 feb 2019
Teen Sustains Multiple Fractures after Beating from Israeli Soldiers
Picture
A Palestinian has teenager sustained multiple fractures in his legs after being assaulted by Israeli soldiers near Jenin city, in the northern West Bank, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent (PRC).

PRC official, Mahmoud Saadi, told WAFA that 17-year-old Majdi Abu-Ghali, from Jenin, was beaten severely, by Israeli soldiers, after he entered the site of the abandoned Israeli settlement of Ghanim, east of Jenin.

The teen was reportedly unaware of the Israeli soldiers who had raided the evacuated settlement, and was surprised by soldiers who shortly attacked and brutally beat him for no reason.

The teenager was moved to nearby Khalil Suleiman public hospital for medical treatment.

Israeli occupation forces have a long record of physically assaulting Palestinians while briefly detaining them. Earlier today, an Israeli court indicted five Israeli soldiers for beating two handcuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainees.

According to the indictment, on a day in early January, the soldiers punched, slapped, kicked and beat the two detainees, hitting them in their head, face, chest, legs and more.

31 jan 2019
IDF soldiers charged with severly beating detained Palestinians
Picture
The two detainees suffered severe rib and nose fractures and needed urgent medical care after five soldiers from the IDF's Netzah Yehuda battalion violently abused them; Palestinian suspects were arrested on suspicion of aiding attacker who killed the soldiers' comrades.

A platoon commander and four combat soldiers from the IDF's religious battalion Netzah Yehuda were indicted Thursday for severely beating two Palestinian detainees, leaving them seriously hurt with fractures in their ribs and noses.

The incident took place earlier this month during a manhunt for As'am Barghouti, who shot dead two soldiers from the Netzah Yehuda Battalion at the Giv'at Asaf outpost in the West Bank in December.
 
The two Palestinians were arrested on suspicion they helped Barghouti and his brother—who were also involved in a terror attack near Ofra Junction that left seven people wounded—evade capture.

The IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said the five soldiers were charged with aggravated abuse and aggravated battery. The soldiers allegedly cursed, slapped, punched and hit the suspects with fists and blunt objects, targeting their heads as well as other body parts, while the two Palestinians were tied up and blindfolded. The soldiers also allegedly kicked the suspects in the groin and pulled on their hair.
 
As the suspects were being transported by the Netzah Yehuda troops, the vehicle passed the Giv'at Asaf Junction, where the two of the soldiers’ comrades—Sergeant Yosef Cohen and Staff Sergeant Yovel Mor Yosef—had been gunned down. This prompted the Nitzan Yehuda soldiers who were sitting in the back of the car with the detainees to start abusing them, while the platoon commander observed but did not interfere.

When a different IDF unit took custody over the detainees in order to transport them to the Shin Bet’s interrogation facility, they noticed the two Palestinians had been physically abused.

The indictment states that footage of the incident, filmed by one of the soldiers, shows the troops cheering as the suspects were being beaten. "At one point, the defendants removed the blindfold from one of the detainees, so he would see his friend being beaten, while the other soldiers were cheering,” the indictment says. “As a result, the two suspects needed urgent medical treatment and were later hospitalized at the Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem."
 
Once at the hospital, doctors found the two Palestinians had suffered severe rib and nose fractures.

Two of the soldiers are also accused of obstructing justice. One of the defendants tried to falsely claim he had trouble speaking Hebrew during his questioning, while another deleted several WhatsApp messages from his phone, which were deemed important to the investigation.

"This indictment should not have been filed to begin with, and we are confident that by the end of the trial all the details will be clarified and things will look differently," said the military defense attorney representing the soldiers. “These are outstanding soldiers, whose comrades were killed just a month prior, forced into a situation in which they had to carry out the arrest of those who murdered their comrades (sic) … the aspects related to their mental health should be taken into consideration.”
 
The Military Prosecution asked the court to extend the remand of the soldiers until the end of the legal proceedings against them.

23 jan 2019
Lebanon: Mossad agent arrested over attempt to kill Hamas official
The Lebanese security authorities on Tuesday announced the arrest of a person accused of being involved in the attempted assassination of a senior Hamas official in early 2018.

In a statement, the Lebanese army said that the intelligence directorate was able to arrest, on January 21, 2019 in Sharhabil area of Sidon city, Hussein Ahmed Battu, whose mission was to monitor and gather information about Hamas official Mohamed Hamdan before the failed attempt to assassinate him on January 14, 2018 through detonating his car.

According to the army’s statement, the detainee confessed to working as a spy for the Israeli intelligence apparatus, Mossad, since 2014 and that he
met with his handlers outside Lebanon and received from them equipment he used to monitor the Hamas official.

He also confessed that he started to monitor Hamdan in the summer of 2017 and provided his handlers with the needed information that led up to the day when another group was assigned by the Mossad to assassinate the target.
Page:  3 - 2 - 1
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.