MK wanted over smuggling phones to jailed Palestinians denies avoiding police

A spokesperson for Basel Ghattas, the Joint (Arab) List MK suspected of smuggling cellphones to Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, denied reports the lawmaker had gone underground in an effort to avoid police questioning over the affair.

“No, we are not in hiding, this is false,” spokesperson Khaled Titi said in a statement Monday. “We have been in contact with police since this morning to coordinate a time.

MK Ghattas will be present for questioning,” the statement said.

According to Channel 2 news, the questioning will take place Tuesday morning.

The report claimed police have surveillance footage supporting allegations that Ghattas passed 15 cellphones and several SIM cards to inmates serving sentences for national security offenses in Ketziot prison outside of of Beersheba.

Ghattas was also suspected of handing “intelligence information” to one of two prisoners, the report said.

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.

Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit on Monday authorized police to question Ghattas under caution for alleged security breaches.

But by Monday evening, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan said Lahav 433 National Crime Unit had been unable to get hold of Ghattas all day.

“He has apparently gone underground, he and his assistant have turned off their phones,” Erdan told Channel 2.

The channel confirmed that Ghattas’s phone was either busy or disconnected when they tried to call.

An attempt by The Times of Israel to reach Ghattas spokesman Tareq Khateeb went straight to voicemail.

While police are usually able to locate suspects by tracking their phones, Ghattas’s immunity as a Knesset member prevented them from such action.

Erdan noted that, while Ghattas could simply be huddling with legal advisers before contacting police to set up his questioning, “the facts are that police have been unable to reach him or his assistants since the morning.”

The minister warned that should Ghattas continue to avoid law enforcement officials, “all police capabilities to locate [wanted persons] will be used.”

The founder of Ghattas’s Balad political party fled Israel in 2007, after suspicions surfaced that he may have passed sensitive information to Hezbollah during the 2006 Second Lebanon War.

The allegations against Ghattas drew a flurry of condemnation from fellow lawmakers.

Environment Minister Ze’ev Elkin on Monday started a petition among lawmakers to have the Joint List lawmaker expelled from the Knesset immediately, without waiting for criminal proceedings.

“Let us put an end to the abuse of parliamentary immunity in order to aid terror,” Elkin tweeted. “I ask MKs to join my initiative to expel MK Basel Ghattas under the impeachment law.”

President Reuven Rivlin said Monday that Ghattas should be stripped of parliamentary immunity and punished severely — if the allegations are proven true.

On Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also called for a severe punishment should the allegations turn out to be true, and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman called the Joint List, of which Balad is a part, a party of “spies and traitors.”

לא רק באסל – סיכול נוסף של הברחת ניידים לאסירים ביטחוניים בשבוע שעבר בכלא קציעות pic.twitter.com/xLFyY8msQw

— כאן | רשת ב (@ReshetBet) December 19, 2016

Meretz party head Zehava Galon also called on Ghattas to resign, branding his alleged crimes “extremely severe.”

She compared the Arab MK to Jewish Home MK Nissan Slomiansky, suspected of sexual offenses, who announced on Sunday that he has suspended himself from the chairmanship of the Knesset Law, Justice and Constitution Committee.

“Just like Slomiansky, [Ghattas] should go home,” Galon said. “However, while the public demand for an MK to resign is legitimate, in these two cases the use of the impeachment law is wrong.”

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

“The accusations leveled against MK Basel Ghattas in the media are very serious, and for this reasons must be evaluated by an investigation, and not in a drumhead court-martial led by Knesset members,” Ayman Odeh said in a statement on M onday. “The presumption of innocence is the right of every person until proven guilty, and thus the bid to prematurely pass judgement on Ghattas is prohibited.”

Odeh claimed the suspicions had led to a “cynical and ugly attempt to make use of the situation in order to incite against the entire Arab public, and to attempt to hinder the rights and immunity of Knesset members.”

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.

Tamam’s mother, Gila, said on Monday that “any lawmaker who helps those who killed my son has blood on his hands.”

According to a law that was passed in June, the impeachment process can be initiated if 70 Knesset members — 10 of whom must be from the opposition — file a complaint with the Knesset speaker against any lawmaker who supports an armed struggle against Israel or incites to racial hatred.

The Knesset House Committee would then debate the complaint before clearing it with a three-quarter majority in the committee. The motion to dismiss the lawmaker would then be sent to the plenum, where, if 90 of the 120 Knesset members vote in favor, the MK would be ousted. The deposed lawmaker could then appeal the decision with the Supreme Court.

Ghattas is a member of the Balad Party, which is part of the Knesset’s Joint (Arab) List and has three of their 13 seats. At the time, the impeachment bill was being discussed Joint (Arab) List chairman Odeh threatened to quit the Knesset if the bill was signed into law.