Friday, January 4, 2019, 13:20 The mother of one of the three minors detained by the GSS on Sunday, December 30, who still have not met with an attorney, called on the GSS not to interrogate the youths on Shabbat.
Translation and transcription of a segment of the mother’s request: “I know my son. I know these boys. Shabbat is the Holy Sabbath and these boys will give up their lives for Shabbat.” … “I hope very much, as we know from other cases in which Shabbat was desecrated, I hope very much that the GSS will not interrogate them harshly and that they will not desecrate Shabbat for them. ‘Shabbat is the source of our blessings’.”
The mother also mentioned that the boys are minors 16 years of age who are under an order prohibiting them to speak to an attorney until Saturday night, after Shabbat.
Attorney Itamar Ben Gvir added, “There have been interrogations during which GSS agents desecrated the Sabbath, forced interrogatees to listen to music, showed them films, and violated the sanctity of the Sabbath. The gatekeepers, who are not the Attorney General, but rather the politicians, the Prime Minister and the Knesset Ministers, are expected to ensure that the minors have a Shabbat that looks like a Shabbat.” See here, here, and here for examples.
Honenu Attorneys Adi Keidar and Nati Rom, who are representing the minors, stated that, “We are disturbed by the fact that the minors will remain in remand over the weekend. We unequivocally demand that the GSS interrogators and the police respect the sanctity of the Sabbath, that they refrain from interrogating the minors on Shabbat and that the minors be provided with everything they need to observe Shabbat.
On the morning of Friday, January 4, approximately one hundred Religious-Zionist rabbis publicized an open letter sent to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked and Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, who is in charge of the Israeli Police, in light of the interrogation by the GSS of the three minors:
“We have been following with great concern the remand of the three Jewish youths currently held by the GSS, who are still prevented from meeting with an attorney.
“Only this week we were exposed to the unacceptable interrogation methods of the GSS in the Duma case, and only this week a court invalidated confessions extracted by the GSS from a suspect in a nationalist crime.”
In conclusion the rabbis wrote, “As those responsible for the legal and law enforcement systems, we expect you to ensure that the youths receive all of their rights granted to them by law, like every youth and child in the State of Israel. An investigation meant to investigate the truth cannot be conducted in secret while trampling on rights.”
On Saturday night, after Shabbat, opposite the Prime Minister’s residence in Jerusalem a mass demonstration will be held at Paris Square with the participation of rabbis, public figures and heads of councils state that: “The residents of Yehuda and Shomron have rights too!”
The demonstration is scheduled to start at 20:00.