Court released 5 “spies” to house arrest – “Their activity centered on organizing demonstrations, not violence”

Tuesday, January 10, 16:29 A short time ago the Jerusalem District Court released to house arrest the five “spies” accused of organizing demonstrations designed to thwart the evacuation of outposts.
The five were released to complete house arrest and ordered to post a large bond as a condition of release. The Attorney General’s office requested a 48 hour delay in carrying out the decision in order to allow them time to appeal to the Supreme Court.
Judge Ben-Ami ruled that the five will remain in complete house arrest in a room isolated from all communications devices and will not be allowed to speak on the telephone or connect to the Internet. Elad Meir, a father of eight children, will be under house arrest at his father-in-law’s home, and will not be allowed to speak to his children or his wife by telephone. In order to ensure that the release conditions are met the judge ruled that some of the detainees will post a bond of 10,000 NIS and the others will post a bond of 15,000 NIS.
The conditions will be examined again in the course of a deliberation on the prima facie evidence in the case.
In her decision Judge Ben-Ami ruled that, “ …however, under the circumstances, there is not a high risk of danger to the public… The charge sheet indicates that most of their activities, other than the gathering of information, centered on organizing nonviolent protests in the area in which there was military activity – including singing, dancing and explaining to the soldiers the meaning of the actions they were required to carry out.”
The Judge also noted that defendants accused of more serious crimes, for example Anat Kam, were released to house arrest.
Honenu attorneys Adi Kedar and David HaLevi represented the detainees.