Ben Gvir urges prisons chief to stay in office despite intention to indict him

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir calls on Prison Service chief Kobi Yaakobi to remain in his position, despite an indictment being expected to be filed against him in the coming days.

“I call on the Prison Service commissioner, hero of Israel, to remain in his position and continue the important work,” the far-right minister writes of Yaakobi, who used to serve as his security secretary before moving to the Prison Service.

Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara reportedly has decided to file charges against Yaakobi for breach of trust and obstructing an investigation. He is suspected of informing Avishai Muallem, a former senior police detective in the West Bank, of a covert probe in which he was suspected of papering over Jewish nationalist violence.

Ben Gvir adds in his statement that Yaakobi “brought about a true revolution in the Prison Service, fully implemented the policy and restored deterrence to the [prison] wings” after “dozens of years of negligence in which the terrorists ran the prisons in practice.”

Under Yaakobi’s leadership, conditions for prisoners have seriously deteriorated, especially in facilities that hold Palestinian security prisoners.

According to a report last year from the Public Defender’s Office, security inmates are given meager food rations, beaten regularly by guards and held in unsanitary conditions that have allowed diseases to spread quickly in crowded, tiny cells. Criminal prisoners, despite enjoying slightly better treatment and larger food portions, still suffer from chronic overcrowding.