MK interrogated on suspicion he gave phones, intel to Palestinian prisoners

A Knesset member presented himself to police Tuesday for questioning over suspicions he smuggled cellphones and coded intelligence information to Palestinian prisoners serving time for terror acts.

Coalition lawmakers have demanded that Basel Ghattas, an MK from the Balad party, part of the Joint (Arab) List faction, be stripped of the immunity he enjoys as a member of Knesset and be put on trial. One MK warned that Ghattas could bring a weapon into the Knesset, where it could be used for an assassination.

Ghattas arrived at the Lahav 433 National Crime Unit in Lod to face accusations that he smuggled cellphones and messages written in code during a visit Sunday with two Palestinian security prisoners at Ketziot Prison, south of Beersheba. One of the two prisoners, both of whom are members of Fatah, is serving a 37-year term for murder.

As he entered the police building Ghattas told reporters, “I will come out with my head held high, and in the end it’ll emerge that it was a mountain out of a molehill.”

Calling the accusations “a political witch hunt,” he said: “We have become accustomed to questioning like this — it is all just to harm our struggle [for the Palestinian cause].”

Housing Minister Yoav Galant of the Kulanu party said that Ghattas and his entire party should be outlawed and its members booted from parliament.

“He should have been immediately brought to trial and his citizenship revoked,” he told Army Radio.

Galant, a former IDF general, said that the cellphones should be considered weapons as they can be used by prisoners to direct terror attacks, and that by smuggling them in Ghattas had “crossed a red line.”

“This is an act of treason that must be treated with the full weight of the law,” he said.

Galant insisted that Balad’s three MKs, Ghattas, Hanin Zoabi, and party leader Jamal Zahalka should all be removed from parliament.

Likud MK Avi Dichter, the head of the influential Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, warned that if Ghattas could smuggle a phone to security prisoners he could also smuggle them weapons — or bring firearms into the Knesset.

“This man could come into the Knesset with a weapon and leave it in his office, and afterward if someone wanted to plan an attack on the prime minister or anyone else, God forbid — you can imagine where it would go,” said Dichter, who used to head the Shin Bet domestic security agency.

“Now that he has been caught, there is no way this man can step into the Knesset, certainly not without a security check.”

On Monday Environment Minister Ze’ev Elkin of Likud started a petition among lawmakers to enact a recently legislated impeachment law and start proceedings to expel Ghattas from the Knesset.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a faction meeting afternoon that he would gladly sign Elkin’s petition.

Police believe that Ghattas entered the prison Sunday with the notes in one pocket of his coat and the phones in the other. The cellphones were miniaturized, finger-sized devices manufactured in the Far East, and cost tens of thousands of dollars each, Channel 2 reported.

Following Ghattas’s visit prison officials searched the Palestinian security prisoners and their cells, discovering the contraband. According to Israeli media reports, investigators asked to speak with Ghattas as he left the facility but he refused, citing his immunity as a lawmaker.

One of the prisoners that Ghattas is alleged to have met with is Walid Daka, who was sentenced to 37 years for the 1984 abduction and murder of 19-year-old IDF soldier Moshe Tamam.

The phones — discovered concealed behind plastic molding surrounding a window in the visitors room — were intended to be collected by prisoners who belong to the Islamic Jihad terror group.

The head of the Joint (Arab) List Ayman Odeh acknowledged Monday that the accusations against Ghattas were “very serious,” but cautioned in a statement that the case should be handled by authorities and not by politicians and noted that Ghattas should be considered innocent until proven guilty.