Tim lawsonGag order lifted on journalist's espionage case
April 10th 2010 12:28
An Israeli court last Thursday lifted a months-long gag order on the case of a young Israeli journalist charged with spying offences. The young woman, Anat Kam, 23, has been accused of stealing over 2,000 military documents and leaking them to a reporter for Israel's oldest daily newspaper, Haaretz.
Kam has been accused of stealing the documents during her two-year compulsory military service, between 2005 and 2007, during which she was working in the office of the commander of the Central Command, which is responsible for the West Bank.
Kam, who went on to work as a reporter for Walla!, a well known Israeli website, has been secretly held under house arrest and is facing espionage charges.
The documents, of which around 700 were classed as 'confidential' or 'highly confidential' by state prosecutors, were leaked to Haaretz reporter, Uri Blau, who then used them for a series of articles.
In 2007, an article of Blau's which used information in the documents to show an event in which the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) had marked three Palestinian militants from Islamic Jihad (a small Palestinian militant group) for assassination. The action was apparently in contravention of strict guidelines for such strikes, set in a ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court.
Israeli authorities believe that Blau still has many of the leaked documents, the suppression order is presumed to have been issued and sustained because authorities hoped to get them back before the case hit the media.
Blau, fled to London on fear of facing criminal charges in Israel for his actions. The pro-Palestinian website, Electronic Infitada (EI), published an article on Blau which stated "Blau himself is in hiding in London, facing, if not a Mossad hit squad, at least the stringent efforts of Israel's security services to get him back to Israel over the opposition of his editors, who fear he will be put away too".
Blau has stated: "When I left Israel I had no reason to believe my backpacking trip with my girlfriend would suddenly turn into a spy movie," he wrote. "Experiences I have read about in suspense novels have become my reality in recent months."
After negotiating with Israeli authorities, Blau returned 50 of the documents; he recently refused a deal that conditioned the terms of his return if he handed over the remainder of the documents, saying: "I decided to fight".
The details of the case were suppressed in Israel for months, until the gag order was lifted last Thursday. According to an article published by Associated Press, "The gag order became the subject of ridicule in the Israeli press, which ran articles with instructions on how readers could find the story from foreign sources online".
An article, published next to Blau's Friday piece, Haaretz accused the Shin Bet (Israel's internal intelligence organisation) of "heavy pressure and threats against a journalist who is carrying out his duties".
Anat Kam
Kam has been accused of stealing the documents during her two-year compulsory military service, between 2005 and 2007, during which she was working in the office of the commander of the Central Command, which is responsible for the West Bank.
Kam, who went on to work as a reporter for Walla!, a well known Israeli website, has been secretly held under house arrest and is facing espionage charges.
The documents, of which around 700 were classed as 'confidential' or 'highly confidential' by state prosecutors, were leaked to Haaretz reporter, Uri Blau, who then used them for a series of articles.
In 2007, an article of Blau's which used information in the documents to show an event in which the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) had marked three Palestinian militants from Islamic Jihad (a small Palestinian militant group) for assassination. The action was apparently in contravention of strict guidelines for such strikes, set in a ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court.
Israeli authorities believe that Blau still has many of the leaked documents, the suppression order is presumed to have been issued and sustained because authorities hoped to get them back before the case hit the media.
Blau, fled to London on fear of facing criminal charges in Israel for his actions. The pro-Palestinian website, Electronic Infitada (EI), published an article on Blau which stated "Blau himself is in hiding in London, facing, if not a Mossad hit squad, at least the stringent efforts of Israel's security services to get him back to Israel over the opposition of his editors, who fear he will be put away too".
Blau has stated: "When I left Israel I had no reason to believe my backpacking trip with my girlfriend would suddenly turn into a spy movie," he wrote. "Experiences I have read about in suspense novels have become my reality in recent months."
After negotiating with Israeli authorities, Blau returned 50 of the documents; he recently refused a deal that conditioned the terms of his return if he handed over the remainder of the documents, saying: "I decided to fight".
The details of the case were suppressed in Israel for months, until the gag order was lifted last Thursday. According to an article published by Associated Press, "The gag order became the subject of ridicule in the Israeli press, which ran articles with instructions on how readers could find the story from foreign sources online".
An article, published next to Blau's Friday piece, Haaretz accused the Shin Bet (Israel's internal intelligence organisation) of "heavy pressure and threats against a journalist who is carrying out his duties".
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