7 female suspects arrested for nationalistic crimes

Settlement residents, 5 of whom are minors, suspected of vandalizing IDF property, cutting down Palestinian olive trees.

By YAAKOV LAPPIN, TOVAH LAZAROFF
Settlers breaking olive tree branches R 311 (photo credit: Reuters)
Settlers breaking olive tree branches R 311
(photo credit: Reuters)
Police arrested seven female residents of West Bank settlements on Sunday on suspicion of carrying out a string of nationalistic crimes against IDF forces and Palestinian property in recent weeks.
The suspects are six minors and one adult. Two of the suspects sneaked into an IDF base in the Binyamin region of the West Bank in September to spray-paint far-right slogans and vandalize IDF vehicles and property.
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They allegedly did this to distract the IDF from the activities of the other five, who at the same time cut down hundreds of Palestinian-owned olive trees near the village of Kusra, police said.
Police said they attributed the acts to the suspects “despite their [young] age.”
The arrests came following a high-priority investigation launched by the Lahav 433 elite police unit, together with the Judea and Samaria police district.
“These actions were prompted by a fear that an outpost would be cleared in November,” a police spokesman added.
The suspects’ attorney, Adi Kedar, described the arrests as “one big scandal” during a remand hearing at the Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court.
Kedar said police lacked “any justification for arrests,” adding that the suspicions amounted to “property crimes.” He later told The Jerusalem Post that one of one of the suspects had spent seven months under house arrest for an alleged “price-tag” incident.
Those charges were dropped once it was clarified that the soldier who testified against her had lied, Kedar said.
Settler sources told the Post that they believed the suspects were innocent.