Father of detained youth to Chief Rabbis: “Help my son keep Shabbat.”

Friday, May 30, 2014, 10:21 An 18-year-old Shomron resident detained on suspicion of involvement with a “Price Tag” incident has been held under severe conditions, including during interrogations, in the GSS Kishon Detention Center since May 20. On Thursday, May 29 he met for the first time with Honenu attorney Yossi Lin. Also on May 29 the father of the youth was informed that youths in similar interrogations had been forced to violate Shabbat. On the morning of Friday, May 30 the father wrote an urgent letter to the Chief Rabbis of Israel requesting that they intervene on behalf of his son.
In his letter the father of the detainee turned to Chief Rabbis HaRav David Lau and the Rishon LeTzion HaRav Yitzhak Yosef requesting that they use their influence on the relevant authorities in order that his son not be forced to violate the upcoming Shabbat.
The father explained the reason for his letter, “To my great shock we were informed yesterday by a first-hand source that one of the youths who was detained recently and was interrogated in similar conditions, at the same location, was interrogated on Shabbat, in violation of Shabbat and in complete disrespect of the holiness of Shabbat. Was there a life-threatening need requiring interrogation of the youths on Shabbat?!”
The youth to whom the father referred in his letter is the youth who was released this week (May 27) after being held for over two weeks, during 11 days of which he was banned from meeting with his attorney, in remand at the Kishon Detention Center. After his release the abuse which he had suffered at the hands of the GSS interrogators became known, including being interrogated for 21 hours a day, including on Shabbat. Additionally during one of the interrogations the youth was choked by a GSS interrogator and during another he fainted when an interrogator screamed in his ear after he dozed off due to the severe physical conditions in which he was being held.
The father explained why he wrote specifically to the Chief Rabbis: “We turn to you in a request for assistance. No-one will listen to us. In light of your eminent status there is a greater likelihood that your request will receive consideration. Please intervene with the relevant authorities in order that our son not be forced, G-d forbid, to violate Shabbat.
“We write this letter with great sadness and shame that in the State of Israel, the state of the Jews, Jews who follow the Torah and its commandments must endeavor so much to ensure that their son who has been detained by the GSS will be able to keep Shabbat,” ended the father his letter with sorrow.