Israeli police and prison service corruption must be mended

Two serious issues involving leftist corruption in the Israeli police and prison system came up this week. The first involves the police forcing a "star witness" in the trumped up accusations against Benjamin Netanyahu to testify against him:

Nir Hefetz, the prosecution’s star witness, said his police interrogation included attempts to destroy his family, as former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s defense team cross-examined him before the Jerusalem District Court on Wednesday.

Hefetz had served as a top aide to Netanyahu for years until 2017, but was flipped by the police into being their key witness against Netanyahu after 15 days of interrogation and detention.

As part of his strategy to undermine the testimony of Hefetz against Netanyahu as coerced and manufactured, Defense lawyer Boaz Ben Tzur was trying to emphasize for a second day how allegedly abusive the police treatment of Hefetz was.

It goes withou saying that to abuse the man in such a way is monumentally offensive, and it certainly damages the police's credibility by making it look more like they stalked his family. This should by all means serve as an important message why leftist partisans cannot remain in running the police.

The second involves the wardens in the prison system "pimping out" female guards to Islamic terrorists, no matter how sexually abusive the latter were:

In June 2018 at 8 p.m., then-Channel 20 journalist Liran Levi broke a story that should have caused an earthquake in this little Israel of ours. He exposed a scandal at Gilboa Prison, [in] which senior prison officials allegedly pimped out young female guards to keep terrorist prisoners happy, allow them to do what they wanted with the women. The same guards were reportedly subjected to sexual harassment and even assaulted by terrorists, and will carry the scars for the rest of their lives.

No one believed Liran. Maybe because it was Channel 20, maybe because he was a young reporter, maybe because it was too horrifying to be true. But Liran didn't give up: he attached himself to the female guards, probed, challenged the Israel Prison Service, the Israel Police, and the State Attorney's Office. Despite everything, the investigation against the prison's intelligence officer, Rani Basha, was closed by Deputy State Attorney Momi Lemberger.

Last week, maybe because of a miracle, the scandal resurfaced when Gilboa Prison Warden Freddy Ben Shitrit testified before a government panel probing a prison break. Ben Shitrit mentioned the "pimping incident," which did not happen on his watch, and admitted that the prison would "pimp out" young female soldiers assigned there and "supplied female soldiers to terrorists for sexual purposes." Is Ben Shitrit trying to distract people from the terrorists' escape? It's not impossible. Still, we should thank him. Too many people swept the affair under the rug too quickly, leaving behind three female guards who were humiliated and scarred and a lack of justice.

Read more. This too is most extremely horrifying, exposes leftist gender bigotry within the prison operating system proper, and cannot be ignored under any circumstances. It's a total embarrassment.

Israel's president Isaac Herzog visits Hebron

The current Israeli president paid a Hanuka visit to Hebron and the Cave of Patriarchs, and was wise to do so, not letting left-wing objections to his visit deter him:

The historic ties of the Jewish people and the State of Israel to the biblical city of Hebron are beyond dispute, President Isaac Herzog said on Sunday, as he marked the first night of Hanukkah by lighting a candle in the Tomb of the Patriarchs.

“My brothers and sisters, today too, with all the complexities – and I am not ignoring these complexities for a moment – the historical affinity of the Jewish people to Hebron, to the Cave of the Patriarchs, to the heritage of our matriarchs and patriarchs, is not in doubt,” Herzog said. “Recognition of this attachment must be beyond all controversy.”

Palestinians and Israeli left-wing politicians and activists protested his decision to visit the city, which they do not recognize as having any connection to Jews despite the Cave being considered the resting place of the patriarchs and matriarchs.

Hamas threatened violence in the wake of Herzog’s visit to Cave.

Well he was wise not to cave to that any more than to the leftists in the Knesset. That's why he's certainly earning some credit and admiration for attending the ceremony at the Patriarchs Cave in Hebron, and proving above all that he can put the subject above politics, as it should be. Thank goodness sanity's prevailed here. A real Hanuka miracle indeed.