Woman tried to smuggle items to Hamas members in jail
By YONAH JEREMY BOBUpdated: OCTOBER 23, 2015 03:34Eshel Prison(photo credit: ISRAEL PRISON SERVICE)
A woman has been sentenced to 14 months in prison after being caught trying to smuggle items inside her bodily orifice wrapped in hygienic pads to Hamas agents in prison.The indictments against “Ipad Imal” Saada along with an indictment against her brother Muhammad Saad and two other Hamas agents in prison were filed in November 2014 by the Southern District Attorney’s Office – one with the Beersheba District Court and one with the magistrate’s court.The indictments followed a series of smuggling and attempted bribery incidents to help Muhammad as well as the two other Hamas agents, Mahmoud Ji’ada and Ismail Awi, to continue to operate on behalf of Hamas from within Ktzi’ot Prison.Awi also served as a Hamas and prisoner spokesman from within the prison.Since February 2014, Awi, in prison for security crimes, conspired to obtain cellphones for Hamas agents to continue operating from inside the prison, including offering bribes to a prison guard of hundreds of thousands of shekels for help.An indictment said that besides attempted bribery, rejected by the prison guard, there were also smuggling operations.In the most creative smuggling incident, on November 18 at 12:45 p.m., Imal, tried to smuggle in to her brother a cellphone and radio inside her bodily orifice wrapped in hygienic pads.Imal received a full body cavity search, which revealed the hidden items and she, her brother and the others were arrested.The ruling rejected an appeal against a similar earlier ruling by the Beersheba Magistrate’s Court.Despite a social worker’s recommendation to be lenient with Imal and keep her out of jail, the court followed the state’s recommendation of giving her jail time in light of the extreme dangers posed by smuggling items to security prisoners, which can empower the prisoners to continue to endanger the state even from behind bars.
