Monday, May 5, 17:37 The court rejected the police request and released the two Yitzhar residents who were suspected of insulting and disturbing a policeman in the line of duty. “If they detain a man because he said ‘You’re a nothing‘ to a policeman, the jails will be filled with thousands of people like that,” says attorney Itamar Ben-Gvir.
The two Yitzhar residents in the 30’s detained yesterday (May 4) by the Department of Nationalist Crime in the Central Unit of the Yehuda and Shomron Police have been released from remand. The court rejected the police demand to extend their remand by five days, but did rule that they be banned from entering Yitzhar for 10 days and also post 3,000 NIS bail as conditions for release.
Attorney Itamar Ben-Gvir, who represented the two detainees on behalf of Honenu, will file an appeal on the restraining order banning them from entering Yitzhar and also on the unusually high bail, which in his opinion are completely unjustified.
The two Yitzhar residents were detained on the basis of detention warrants issued three weeks ago that were not carried out by the police even though policemen from the Central Unit of Yehuda and Shomron Police encountered them numerous times in Yitzhar. At one of the times one of the detainees was witness to a search of his neighbor’s house, however the policemen did not take the trouble to to detain him or to summon him to an interrogation. Only on Sunday, May 4 did the police choose to carry out the detention warrants and detain the two. However on Monday, May 5 the police claimed that the detention was carried out subsequent to an incident which took place last Saturday night (after Shabbat) when police conducted a search at the family home of one of the families whose car is suspected of being involved with a recent “Price Tag” incident in Umm al-Fahm.
According to the two detainees during the search a detective captain by the name of Roman assured them that they would be detained after, according to him, one of them insulted him and called him, “a complete nothing” as the detectives scattered the family’s belongings in their house during the course of the search.
“This is a preposterous detention which proves that the Department of Nationalist Crime in Yehuda and Shomron has lost all proportions,” said attorney Ben-Gvir in response. “If they arrest every man who says “You’re a nothing,” to a policeman the jails will be filled with thousands of people like that. Despite their release we will fill an appeal on the decision. In our opinion the police must compensate the detainees for this remand.”