PM calls for voiding citizenship of Israeli Islamic State recruits

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that he is pushing to revoke the citizenship of Israeli citizens who join the Islamic State terror group, several days after authorities said they uncovered a cell in a central Israeli town.

Netanyahu made the comments at the opening of the weekly cabinet meeting at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem.

“Last week indictments were served against citizens who joined Islamic State,” he said at the start of the cabinet meeting. “I have asked the attorney general to move ahead with revoking the citizenship of anyone who joins the organization.”

The prime minister was referring to a group of residents from the northern Israeli Arab town of Jaljulia who were charged after allegedly plotting to make their way to Syria and fight alongside the IS jihadist group.

“Whoever joins Islamic State will not be an Israeli citizen, and if he leaves the country’s borders he will not return,” Netanyahu added and noted that the concept of revoking citizenship for those who join IS was becoming more accepted in the international community.

Last week the district attorney filed indictments against the six men, who stand accused of contacting an enemy agent, conspiracy to commit a crime, attempting to travel to an enemy state and assisting travel to an enemy state.

The group had planned to join IS and two of its members traveled to Turkey in the hope of crossing into Syria but returned to Israel when they failed to link up with IS contacts. A seventh member of the group, Nadal Hamad Salah Salah, 23, flew a hang glider across the border from the Golan Heights and into Syria on October 24, setting off an intensive investigation by security services.

The Shin Bet said at the time it was expending resources on preventing Israeli citizens from leaving for Syria, calling it an immediate threat to national security.

A number of attackers linked to a series of bombings and shootings in Paris last week were thought to have spent time in Syria fighting for IS.

Recently three residents of the Lower Galilee town of Yafia, supporters of Islamic State, confessed to planning attacks in Israel, the Shin Bet statement added.