The Ramla Magistrates Court found Abie Nathan guilty Thursday of meeting with Yasir Arafat and other members of the Palestine Liberation Organization, in violation of Israeli law. He will be sentenced next month.
The 64-year-old Israeli peace activist readily admitted the meetings but insisted they had not “endangered the security of Israel,” as the prosecution contends.
It is not the first time Nathan has been convicted for meeting the PLO leader. His most recent encounter with Arafat took place in June in Tunis.
Shortly before that he completed four months of a seven-month prison sentence imposed for a 1989 meeting with Arafat. Nathan also got a one-year suspended sentence on that occasion, which he may now have to serve.
He told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency before Thursday’s hearing that he expected the prosecution to ask the court to invoke the suspended sentence.
The prosecutor obliged and demanded a stiff new sentence on top of it, to make an example of a high-profile personality who claims the right to violate the law.
Nathan told the court, as he has on previous occasions, that his activities are aimed at promoting peace between enemies. He claimed that scores of Israelis have met with Arafat but that only he has been punished.
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