Remand extended for Israeli-Arab linked to Islamic State

The remand for an Israeli-Arab teacher accused of being associated with the Islamic State was on Wednesday extended until Sunday, after the Hadera Magistrate’s Court insisted it had incriminating evidence against him, Channel 10 reported.

Police said Monday a teacher from a predominantly Israeli-Arab town in the Galilee was arrested on suspicion of “being associated with the Islamic State.”

The man, 24, is a teacher of Islam at a high school in Kafr Kanna, where he lives. A search of his house revealed books, documents and files relating to banned terror organizations, including an Islamic State flag, police said.

The teacher “was recently in Jordan, and is being questioned by police in connection with being associated with the Islamic State,” police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told The Times of Israel.

“We confiscated materials from his house, including computers and flags and other [items] connected with the Islamic State…he brought back the materials from Jordan, and the investigation is continuing,” he said.

The defendant said he was in Jordan to study, and his lawyer maintained that the paraphernalia bore Islamic symbols that are unrelated to the jihadist organization, the TV station reported Wednesday.

The Islamic State flag bears the shahada Islamic creed, which states: “There is no god but Allah, Muhammad is the messenger of Allah.”

Possession of materials from a designated terror organization is illegal under Israeli law.

Last week, an Israeli citizen was found guilty of traveling to an enemy country and joining Islamic State during a four-month stay in Syria earlier this year. Ahmad Sorbaji, 23, of Umm al-Fahm, was found by the Haifa District Court to have entered Syria, a country with which Israel is officially at war, and to have received military training from Syrian rebel groups, including Islamic State, with the intention of fighting in the Syrian civil war. His sentence is to be handed down at a later date.

The Islamic State group was officially declared a terror organization by Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon earlier this year, giving Israeli officials wider tools to prosecute suspected members.

Some 10 Arab citizens of Israel have left the country to join the Islamic State, a Shin Bet security service source was quoted by the Israel Hayom newspaper as saying in September. An additional number is believed to have traveled to join more moderate rebel groups such as the Free Syrian Army. Several Israeli Arabs have reportedly been killed in Syria.