Despite all the denials that he is not and was not ever a member of Hamas, and was nothing more than a simple electrical power plant engineer, the Gaza Plant’s Power Deputy Director of Operations, Dirar Abu Sisi — who was abducted from a train in the Ukraine on 18-19 February and flown to Israel within hours in the custody of Israeli Mossad agents — was indicted today on shockingly serious charges of developing missiles to fire at Israel.
The indictment was filed Monday, as had been predicted last week, and in a Beersheva court. Abu Sisi has been held for a month in Ashkelon’s Shikma Prison, apparently after nearly two weeks of interrogation by Israel’s General Security Services (GSS or Shin Bet or Shabak) near Petach Tikva.
Haaretz reported today that “Ukraine says Abu Sisi’s disappearance is under investigation. Israel has not provided details on how the Palestinian came into its custody, although Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week it was a ‘legal arrest’.” This report is posted here. The Haaretz report notes that Hamas has said that Abu Sisi is not a member of the organization — which is banned in Israel as a terrorist organization.
Here is the full text of the information about the indictment, as communicated by the spokesperson of the Israeli Ministry of Justice:
“The Southern District Attorney’s Office submitted to the Be’er Sheva District Court, today (Monday), 4.4.11, an indictment against Dirar Abu Sisi, a resident of the Gaza Strip and member of the Hamas organization’s administration.
According to the indictment, beginning in 2002, Abu Sisi was engaged in the development of missiles to be launched by Hamas into the State of Israel, including increasing their range and ability to pierce steel so as to penetrate IDF armored vehicles and thus strike at soldiers.
Similarly, Abu Sisi administered the Hamas military academy, which was established following Operation Cast Lead as part of Hamas’s lessons from the war. Abu Sisi is accused of nine charges regarding activity in a terrorist organization, hundreds of counts of attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder and production of weaponry offenses.
According to the indictment, Abu Sisi received his doctorate at the Kharkov Military Engineering Academy in Kharkov, Ukraine, and studied under Prof. Konstantin Petrovich, an expert in SCUD missile control systems. During his studies, Abu Sisi acquired extensive knowledge in missile development, control systems, propulsion and stabilization.
Parallel to his work as an engineer for the Gaza electric company, Abu Sisi secretly joined Hamas. In the framework of his Hamas activity, between 2002-2008, Abu Sisi held a role in administration of the Hamas organization, with responsibility for electricity in the context of a committee headed by senior Hamas militant Muhammad Deif, and which was engaged in developing and improving missiles and mortars of various types. Abu Sisi’s activity led to the development of deadly missiles that were launched beginning in 2002, and which are still being launched at the State of Israel and at IDF armored vehicles, thus harming the security of residents of the State and IDF soldiers on a daily basis.
According to the indictment, following Operation Cast Lead, Abu Sisi was appointed to direct the establishment of a military academy that would train Hamas officers and commanders for combat, and, in fact, established the academy.
The indictment attributes to Abu Sisi many counts of attempted murder in that he was party to hundreds of attempts to cause the death of residents of the State of Israel and IDF soldiers; offenses of membership in a terrorist organization in that he served in the Hamas organization administration; and offenses of criminal conspiracy in that he manufactured and developed missiles of various types; criminal conspiracy for firing missiles at the State of Israel; and manufacturing weapons.
The indictment was filed by Moran Gaz from the Southern District Attorney’s Office”.
If all this is true, then shouldn’t Abu Sisi be a Prisoner of War?
Being a member of Hamas is one thing — and it is something that has been denied by Abu Sisi’s Ukranian wife, Veronika, and by his brother, and his lawyer Smardar Ben Natan and others. But how is it reasonable or possible that a Gazan Palestinian can be tried in Israel on charges of belonging to Hamas. But accusations of establishing a military academy, and working on improving electrical systems for projectiles to be fired into Israel are something else…
On Monday Ben Natan said to journalists, according to a report published by Ma’an News Agency, that “her client had confessed to ‘certain things’ that she could not elaborate about because of court-imposed restrictions. She said his confessions were made ‘under very heavy duress which I would characterize as torture’.”
His lawyer’s accusation that Abu Sisi had been tortured in Israeli custody is published here/
The same Ma’an story reported that “Abu Sisi’s family told Ma’an that Dirar was abducted because he had been able to engineer a switch in fuel source for the Gaza Power Plant”, which added some smuggled Egyptian regular and less costly regular diesel to the special industrial diesel fuel brought from Israel and imported through Israeli crossings.
Last week, the buzz was all about Abu Sisi knowing something about the June 2006 capture of IDF Corporal Gilad Shalit in a cross-border raid from Gaza on an IDF position at Kerem Shalom (just over the south-east corner from Gaza, where the borders of Gaza, Israel, and the Egyptian Sinai meet). Even more, the speculation was that Abu Sisi would be held for a trade, involving the release of Shalit, who is still apparently being held somewhere in Gaza.
Richard Silverstein reported on his Tikun Olam blog, here, on Abu Sisi’s first public appearance in an Israeli courtroom last Thursday, at which he told journalists: “They interrogated me about Gilad Shalit but I have no connection or information about him. It’s all lies. I am merely a simple man and electrical engineer. I send my love to my family. I am innocent”.
The same day that reporters were first allowed tho see Abu Sisi in court (last Thursday), news was released about an awkward telephone exchange between a stiff and cautious Veronika Abu Sisi and Gilad Shalit’s father, Noam, who asked her for help in gaining his son’s release.
Silverstein, on his blog, was the first to break the story about the gag order placed on this case — which is now apparently being lifted. In Thursday’s story, Silverstein wrote: “Defense minister Ehud Barak has now gotten into the act and reinforced Netanyahu’s claim that Abusisi knows about Shalit. This appears to be the line that the Israeli security services have fixed on as most likely to bring a prison sentence against him after two trial balloons linking him to building missiles under Iranian training and the Victoria arms shipment were apparently dropped. Yossi Melman is also reporting [in Haarzet] based on security sources that Abusisi will be charged with membership in a terror organization and aiding Hamas in manufacturing weapons. The latter is a charge whispered by another TV news military correspondent weeks ago. So here you can see how the gag works. The defense and anyone sympathetic to the defendant may not report on matters that might work in his favor. However, the prosecution and Shabak may leak at will to their chosen favorite reporters, who dutifully put it in the media pipeline. Once again revealing a system stacked against all security detainees and in favor of the State”…
The Jerusalem Post’s well-briefed Defense Correspondent Yaakov Katz reported today here that “During his studies, Abu Sisi acquired extensive knowledge in missile development, control systems, propulsion and rocket stabilization. After returning to the Gaza Strip and parallel to his work as an engineer for the Gaza electric company, Abu Sisi was secretly recruited into Hamas by the military commander of the terrorist organization at the time, Salah Shehada, and began working as one of their leading engineers for short- and long-range missiles. Abu Sisi not only developed missiles in Gaza but was also, according to the indictment, responsible for upgrading thousands of older rockets and increasing their range and penetration capabilities … Abu Sisi, officials said, provided valuable intelligence information during his interrogation on Hamas’s military wing, its different branches and the decision making process within the terror group. In 2002, Abu Sisi met Sheikh Nizar Rayan, a spiritual leader of Hamas’s military wing who was later assassinated during Operation Cast Lead in 2009. Rayan introduced Abu Sisi to various senior Hamas operatives including Saleh Shehada. Due to his education as an engineer, Abu Sisi was asked by Shehada to assist in developing weaponry for Hamas. He later joined a committee that was responsible for the research and development of weaponry and was responsible for electrical engineering dealing mostly with developing boosters and fins that stabilized and enhanced the range of Hamas’s arsenal of rockets. In 2005, Abu Sisi was asked by the committee to begin working on increasing the range of rockets that were manufactured domestically in the Gaza Strip. Due to his involvement Hamas, he was able to increase the range of the rockets from six to nine kilometers, and subsequently to 15 kilometers. In 2007, Abu Sisi assisted Hamas in increasing range of rockets to 22 kilometers. He was then asked by Hamas to increase the range to between 37 and 45 kilometers, and participated in several experiments during which rockets were tested and fired into the Mediterranean. These attempts did not succeed. One of the tank missiles that Abu Sisi helped develop is the ‘Yassin’, which has the ability to penetrate between 16 and 26 centimeters of reinforced steal. He also worked to increase the penetration to 37 centimeters.
Abu Sisi also developed an anti-tank mortar shell called ‘Abu Rassin’ with a special range of 100 meters and can penetrate 87 centimeters of steel. He later made efforts to increase penetration to 100 cm, and worked on another anti-tank missile called ‘Al Batar’, which has a 100-meter range. With Abu Sisi’s aid, Hamas translated Russian manuals of the Igla-S shoulder-to-air missile into Arabic. After Operation Cast Lead in 2009 Abu Sisi was asked by Hamas to help establish a military academy in the Gaza Strip. In this position, Abu Sisi created a plan for the school that included three main subjects: military, administration, and religion. The plan was then submitted to various Hamas leaders during meetings in Abu Sisi’s house in 2009. In 2010, according to the indictment, Abu Sisi met with Hamas operatives from Syria during a trip to Mecca”…