Israeli Arab sentenced to jail time after joining Syrian rebels

Hikmat Massarwa acknowledges his actions could have threatened ‘the security of the state,’ given 30 months in prison

An Arab Israeli who joined the rebel Free Syrian Army was given 30 months of jail time in Israel Tuesday, after he agreed to a plea bargain and admitted contacting an enemy agent, illegally leaving the country and infiltration.

At the hearing Monday, the Shin Bet security service said it “sees Arab Israelis going to Syria as a very dangerous phenomenon,” and noted only a handful had crossed the border and tried to join one of the sides in the civil war.

The verdict against Hikmat Massarwa was given due to the fact that Israel and Syria are officially at a state of war and it is illegal for Israeli citizens to travel to the neighboring country or be in touch with its officials — an act which could be punished as treason or espionage.

As part of a plea deal that included a sentence of 30 months, Massarwa acknowledged his acts could have posed a threat “to the security of the State of Israel.”

“The prosecution were definitely looking for a deterrent effect here, and they got it, even though they scaled down the penalty,” Helal Jaber, Massarwa’s lawyer, told Reuters.

The 29-year-old Massarwa, a resident of Taibe in the Galilee, was arrested March 19 by the Shin Bet and police after returning to Israel from Syria, through Turkey.

In April, the Shin Bet said Massarwa had undergone military training at a camp operated by the Free Syrian Army, one of the groups leading the fight against Syrian President Bashar Assad. Massarwa claimed he crossed into the neighboring country in search of his brother.

The statement said he traveled to the neighboring country “with the aim of joining world jihad elements.” One of the original charges against Massarwa was that he underwent military training by an enemy country, a charge dropped in the plea bargain.

In May, Judge Avraham Yaakov said the case at hand was different from the classic cases addressed by these laws. “There’s no legal guidance regarding the rebel groups fighting in Syria,” Reuters quoted Yaakov as saying.

At Monday’s hearing, the Shin Bet revealed Massarwa was asked by the rebels to “carry out a suicide attack against the forces of the Assad regime, but he says he refused to do it.”