Ghattas says prosecution part of political witch hunt

Arab Israeli MK Basel Ghattas, suspected of smuggling cellphones and intelligence information to inmates in Israeli prison, denied the allegations against him and said they are part of a political witch hunt as he was released on bail Tuesday.

Ghattas was released to house arrest Tuesday afternoon, five days after he was arrested on suspicion of passing phones and intelligence information to Palestinian terrorists in Israeli prison.

“I did not do anything that they say I did,” Ghattas, from the Balad faction within the Joint (Arab) List Knesset party, told the al-Jazeera channel after his release. “The aim is the political assassination of an Arab member of Knesset.”

“I think that this is part of the deterioration of the political system in Israel that includes racism, the rise of the right and political and religious extremism,” he said.

Ghattas said that the decision by the police to prosecute a member of the Knesset for security offenses was “unprecedented,” and that it was “clear to me from the first moment that I had not done what they say,” he said.

Ghattas was arrested on Friday after waiving his parliamentary immunity amid accusations that he gave the cellphones, along with SIM cards and coded messages to two Palestinian inmates.

The lawmaker refused to tell investigators who gave him the smuggled phones but his lawyers claimed Monday that police already knew who provided them. Ghattas has reportedly admitted that Daka asked him to bring him books from a third party, but maintains he was unaware of the contents of the package.

Ghattas said that it was the moral duty of Arab MKs to defend the rights of Palestinian prisoners.

“We are willing to pay any price to to defend the rights of our people and of the prisoners in particular,” he said.

Palestinian lawmakers say that Palestinian security prisoners often have harsher conditions than Israeli security prisoners, most notably access to telephones to communicate with their families.

“My personal connection as a MK with the Palestinian prisoners is well known. I keep track of their problems and visit them in prison,” he said.

Police had requested that Ghattas spend 45 days under house arrest while they investigate the case against him.

Police spokesperson Luba Samri said that according to the terms of his release Ghattas will be permitted to attend Knesset debates and votes accompanied by supervisors who will escort him to the entrance of the plenum.

Channel 10 reported that the Knesset legal adviser had first asked the Shin Bet security agency for an assessment whether Ghattas posed a danger, before deciding to allow him in.

In addition, Ghattas is forbidden to contact other suspects in the case. He is also barred from leaving the country and may not visit detention facilities to meet with security prisoners for 180 days.

Police reportedly want him detained over concerns he might flee the country, like Balad founder Azmi Bishara, who fled Israel in 2007 to escape a police and Shin Bet investigation into allegations he was paid by Hezbollah to help locate targets for rocket attacks within Israel.

Appearing in court on Monday, Ghattas challenged his detention, asking the court whether there was any need for him to have been in custody for the past four days without being asked a single question.

He also asked why, as a Christian, he had to spend Christmas in prison. He also asked whether police would have treated him differently if he weren’t an Arab.