Five members of a sabotage and espionage ring received prison sentences today in the Haifa District Court. The sentences ranged from nine years to life imprisonment.
The ring, which was uncovered in August, 1983, planned to explode a car bomb under the 36-story Shalom Tower skyscraper in Tel Aviv, Israel’s tallest building. Other targets, according to the charge sheets, included the Haifa oil refineries, Dizengoff Street in Tel Aviv, and bus stations in Jerusalem and northern Israel.
The gang was uncovered when a Lebanese national, Farid Abdel Halik, 21, tried to drive a booby-trapped Mercedes car through the Rosh Hanikra frontier checkpointon the Israel-Lebanon border. An examination of the car yielded 121 pounds of high explosives in a reserve gasoline tank. Also found were detonators and electronic sabotage equipment. Abdel Halik was today sentenced to life imprisonment.
Other members of the ring sentenced today, five Druze from Galilee, some of whom had served in the Israel Defense Force, were Romat Kawikas 23, to 15 years in prison; two others to 10-year sentences; and one to nine years. Salah Kawikas, 27, the ringleader, was ordered to undergo psychiatric examination after he claimed that he was insane.
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