Israeli diplomat indicted for beating up his daughter

A senior diplomat serving in an important Israeli representative office abroad was arrested when arriving in Israel recently, after his daughter complained he had beaten her, Hebrew-language website Ynet reported Wednesday.

The Foreign Ministry suspended the diplomat until the end of proceedings. The diplomat was not named.

The state prosecution, Ynet reported, indicted him for attacking a minor, causing injury, and for trying to dissuade the girl from filing a police complaint against him.

“From the beginning of his marriage he beat his daughter, the complainant, sometimes with a belt, as one of his methods of education,” the indictment alleges, referring to the man’s second marriage, after his first wife, the girl’s mother, died.

The diplomat married last year, and his relationship with his daughter deteriorated, his lawyer reportedly said.

He allegedly started beating his daughter after a fight broke out between them early on in his new marriage. He would use a belt against the child, and once forcefully pushed the girl into the shower in the couple’s house, bruising her arm.

On a family trip, the girl allegedly asked an employee at a gas station to call the police, fearing that he would harm her. The family drove away and the father, learning of her attempt to summon help, beat her again.

Avi Himi, a lawyer representing the diplomat, told Ynet that the man “raised the girl with dedication and love. From 2003, when her mother died, their relationship deteriorated, and especially over the last year, when he remarried.”

The Foreign Ministry said the diplomat has been suspended until his case is “clarified.”

“This is an allegation of criminal conduct within the family, having nothing to do with the Foreign Ministry or the defendant’s mission abroad,” the ministry said.