Israel arrests a teacher for helping Hamas

Shafaq News/ A teacher was arrested after providing Hamas with the location of a Israeli military industrial plant to help Hamas fire rockets toward the plant, the Shin Bet and police said on Sunday.

"The suspect was identified as Rami Habibullah, a resident of Ein Mahil, a town near Nazareth. The Shin Bet and police found that, in light of the conflict in Gaza, Habibullah decided to contact Hamas operatives abroad and offer to help promote terrorist activities in Israel," the Jerusalem Post wrote.

Habibullah provided a Hamas operative with a photo of a defense industry plant near his home and the exact location of the plant, intending to have Hamas fire rockets toward the site. "He also collected funds for the terrorist group and provided information on several sensitive locations."

"The teacher also worked to recruit other Israeli Arabs to help in promoting terrorist activity within Israel, including Khaled Saleh, a 35-year-old resident of Ein Mahil. Saleh was also arrested and during questioning it emerged that Saleh had agreed to carry out terrorist activities together with Habibullah and had even offered to provide weapons for such operations."

Another suspect connected to the case is being held in administrative detention.

On Sunday, the Northern District Attorney's office filed an indictment against Habibullah and Saleh to the District Court in Nazareth. Habibullah has been charged with "a series of national security crimes, including making contact with a foreign agent, making illegal purchases for the purpose of terrorism, and conspiracy to commit an act of terrorism, among other crimes. Saleh is charged with conspiracy to commit an act of terrorism."

"This is a serious action by Israeli citizens who hatched a malicious plan with Hamas operatives while the State of Israel is in the midst of fighting against that terrorist organization. This activity was thwarted in the initial stages even before the squad members had time to execute the plan for terrorist activity inside Israel," said the Shin Bet and Israel Police.

"The Shin Bet and Israel Police take very seriously any involvement of Israeli citizens in activities that endanger the security of the state and will continue to act in accordance with the authority given to them by law and will use all the means at their disposal to thwart threats in a targeted manner in the face of threats within Israeli society, without this harming the normative majority in society," continued the joint statement.

The Gidonim (33) unit in the Lahav 433 national crime unit took part in the arrest of the suspects, releasing footage of the arrests on Sunday.

Habibullah and Saleh are the latest in a series of Israeli citizens arrested for working with Hamas in the past two years.

On Friday, a Bedouin Israeli from al-A'sam, located southeast of Beersheba, was indicted on charges that he crossed into Gaza and joined Hamas in 2016, providing the terrorist organization with information about the locations of IDF bases and training with the Nukhba forces, one of the main Hamas forces that conducted the October 7 massacre.

The Bedouin young man, Juma'a Abu Ganima, was arrested in December while he was trying to infiltrate back from Gaza into Israeli-controlled territories.

Last May, an Israeli Arab from Umm el-Fahm was arrested by the Shin Bet and Israel Police after he was recruited by Hamas to conduct a bombing attack on a bus in the Hadera area.

The suspect, identified as Muhammad Nadir Mahajna, began to draw close to the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood and decided to carry out attacks against Israeli targets.

Mahajna collected information about potential targets for the planned bombing attack, with a focus on defense facilities and crowded areas, and sent the information he collected to Hamas.

The Gidonim (33) unit also took part in Mahajna's arrest.

In January 2023, two Israelis from the northern town of Mu’awiya were arrested after being recruited by Hamas to carry out bombing attacks in Israel.

In October 2022, three Israelis were indicted for helping build a cyber threat against communications infrastructure used by the Israeli military and for providing sensitive information to Hamas in Turkey.

The main suspect in the case, identified as R.A., worked as a software engineer at Cellcom, which provides services to the Israeli army and police. The suspect had broad access privileges to the company’s computer and information systems.