Shomron residents recruited by intelligence officer

Thursday, June 9, 2016, 11:48 Recently numerous Shomron residents turned to Honenu’s legal aid headquarters with very similar stories of attempts by Amir, an officer in the Intelligence Department of the Yehuda and Shomron District Police, to recruit Shomron residents as agents, generally taking advantage of an individual’s personal crisis. Amir approached the Shomron residents and attempted by various, sometimes strange, means to arrange meetings with them in order to recruit them as agents who would incriminate their neighbors and friends in incidents of “nationalistic crime”. Honenu recommends that anyone who is approached in a recruitment attempt of this type consult the organization for legal counsel.
Usually the individuals approached are in the midst of personal crises and the police officer promises them benefits, money, or closing criminal cases in return for cooperation. In at least one case the officer threatened a resident with opening criminal cases against him if he did not cooperate.
At the time of this posting, Honenu had received its most recent request for assistance in this matter on Wednesday, June 8. A male Shomron resident leading a normative life turned to Honenu’s legal aid headquarters and said that Amir requested a private meeting with him, but refused to send a formal summons to report to the police station.
After receiving counsel from Honenu Attorney Adi Kedar, the resident informed Amir that he is invited to contact Kedar, his legal representative, and through him coordinate a meeting at the police station. The resident also informed Amir that he told his friends about the attempts to invite him to a “recruitment discussion”.
Honenu is aware that it is an accepted practice for intelligence officers to recruit criminals as sources of intelligence in the crime world, however in the vast majority of cases, the Shomron residents being recruited are normative individuals not involved with crime. It is only due to their place of residence that the police are attempting to recruit them as agents. Honenu advises anyone who is approached in a recruitment attempt to receive professional legal counsel from one of the attorneys at the organization’s legal aid headquarters.
Honenu: “Unfortunately, in recent years we have seen many individuals who have been dragged into being agents. They have said that they harmed friends and family and they harmed themselves even more, because their handlers in the police and the Jewish Department of the ISA ‘threw them to the dogs’. The fact that officers in the Intelligence Department take advantage of normative individuals experiencing a crisis in order to coerce them into incriminating their friends and neighbors shows the moral low to which the Yehuda and Shomron Police have reached. We hope that the police will immediately cease this practice.”