Two Jewish terrorists, Yitzhak Pas of Hebron and his brother-in-law Mattitiyahu Shvu of the illegal Maon Farm settlement, caught in July en route for Jerusalem in a car carrying 40 kilograms of explosives, were convicted Tuesday of weapons-related crimes under a plea bargain.
Under the plea bargain, the two men were not charged with
passing the explosives to a third suspected terrorist, Shachar Dvir.
The Jerusalem District Court is expected to hand down a
verdict in two months.
The two terrorists were indicted in August for having transported explosives stolen from the Israeli army. Pas and Shvu were arrested on July 17 at the Hizmeh checkpoint in the West Bank, headed for Jerusalem.
The car in which they were travelling contained eight "bricks" of explosives, which weighed a total of 40 kilograms.
Prosecutor Dan Eldad, for his part, said the bricks were stolen from the Israeli army, where upon the Israeli military markings were removed from their wrappers.
He said the quantity of explosives seized in their possession was greater than that used in a number of Palestinian bombing attacks.
"This is weaponry that is used in offense, not in defense," he said. "It is used in attacks not against individuals but against large numbers of innocent people."
It should be stressed that the two Jewish terrorists were convicted only for "weapons-related crimes". One of the suspicions under which the two terrorists were originally investigated, that they were on their way to carry out an attack against Palestinians, was not included in the indictment.
The Israeli security agency's probe also examined alleged involvement of the two in terrorist attacks against Palestinians in which bombs were used. However, the investigation did not yield "sufficient evidence" to warrant inclusion of the additional suspicion in the indictment. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
