Attorney General Yitzhak Zamir has served notice that any Knesset member who tries to enter an enemy country or meet with members of the Palestine Liberation Organization would be subject to criminal proceedings initiated by the State.
Zamir’s opinion, submitted to the Cabinet Thursday, was seen as a direct warning to Abdul Wahab Darousha, an Arab Labor Party MK, who left Israel last Tuesday in an unsuccessful attempt to reach Amman, Jordan where he had hoped to address the meeting of the PLO-convened Palestine National Council (PNC).
Darousha got as far as Cyprus and returned to Israel Thursday. Zamir noted, in his brief to the Cabinet, that contact with an “enemy agent” was a felony punishable by up to 15 years’ imprisonment. He asserted that contrary to press reports, several Israeli political figures who met with PLO representatives abroad in recent years, were indeed brought to trial. It is not yet known whether legal action will be taken against Darousha for declaring his intention and purpose for going to Amman, though he never reached Jordan. He claimed in a telephone interview from Cyrpus that the Jordanian authorities refused him entry. Most observers believe he abandoned his mission under intense pressure from Labor Party colleagues.
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