Israel Matzav

Israeli secret agent threatened to kill me

Imagine that. Al-Guardian reports that a "British charity worker," who was deported from Israel last week, hopefully never to return, is complaning that General Security Service (Shin Bet) agents threatened to kill him.

According to al-Guardian:

Ayaz Ali returned from Israel to Britain last week after a military judge ruled he had done nothing wrong. On his release, the Israeli government issued a statement accusing Ali, 35, of assisting Hamas and implied that he was a neo-Nazi and a supporter of al-Qaeda.

Ali, an accountant, arrived in Israel last December to direct aid efforts by Islamic Relief in Gaza and the West Bank. The Birmingham-based charity, which works with Britain's Department for International Development, provides fortified milk for children, imports artificial limbs and runs education centres.

A Department for International Development spokesman said it had no reason to believe there was any truth in the allegations against Ali or Islamic Relief.

Ali, speaking from his home in Birmingham, said he had no problems until 9 May when he was stopped by police as he drove from Gaza towards Jerusalem and told he was being detained in connection with terrorism. He was taken to a prison in Ashkelon where he was blindfolded, handcuffed, shackled and put in a cell measuring 6ft by 8ft.

Every day he was taken to an interrogation room to be questioned for up to 14 hours under bright lights by agents of Israel's internal security agency, Shin Bet, while handcuffed and shackled to a chair. When his interrogators deemed he was being co-operative, his handcuffs were removed; they were replaced when they believed he was not helpful.

'They were brilliant at playing mind games. They said they knew everything about me and they had been watching me for five months. They knew my wife was expecting a baby, and told me I would never see my baby. I just tried to be completely honest,' Ali said.

The balance of the article goes on to describe Ali's interrogation.

What's missing in the Al-Guardian article is a full accounting of who and what "Islamic Relief" is. As you may have guessed by now, they're not exactly an innocent charitable organization. Elder of Ziyon fills us in (he is responding to a BBC account, which is if anything, slightly more honest that Al-Guardian's account, which does not mention Islamic Relief's connection to Hamas):

So the BBC, clearly sympathetic to Mr. Ayaz, highlights Hamas' "social services" and "kindergartens and clinics"; starts a new section of the story, and then mentions as an afterthought that Israel considers Hamas a terrorist organization.

They give specifics on Hamas' social work, but any specific examples of terror are left unwritten - in fact, the implication is that only Israel considers Hamas a terrorist organization, while the rest of the enlightened world knows that Hamas is a humanitarian network of charities and hospitals.

The BBC also fails to mention that Islamic Relief has been accused of terror ties itself. Russia accused it of supporting Chechnyan terror groups; they seem to have accepted money from Al-Qaeda front groups, and their "orphans" are often the children of terrorists, allowing Islamic Relief to reward terror.

In other words, any facts or background information that may indicate that Ayaz is in fact a terror supporter are completely ignored, and anything that makes him look like an innocent aid worker and victim of unwarranted Israeli aggression is highlighted.

I trust none of that was a surprise to any of you. Al-Guardian claims that Mr. Ali plans never to return to Israel. Let's hope they're at least right about that.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:56 AM