Jews are still being seized and interned in Latrun despite their acquittal in court or release on bail pending a trial.
One of the most flagrant cases is that of 17-year-old Isaac Bavli who was arrested on May 20 for illegal distribution of leaflets. When he was finally brought to trial on Sept. 19, the judge scored the police officials for having held him so long without trial. The judge asked the complaining policeman what would happen if the accused were acquitted. The answer was that he would be re-arrested and interned immediately.
The judge then declared Bavli guilty and sentenced him to six months imprisonment dating from the day of his arrest. With the remitting of one-third of his sentence for good behaviour, which is customary in Palestine, Bavli actually had to serve only one day. The following day when he was released, however, a policeman was waiting to take him into custody again.
Two other youths, Samuel Goldman and Isaac Eliahu Mizrachi, also arrested for distributing illegal handbills, were released on $200 bail by the chief magistrate of Jerusalem and the police were ordered to release them if bail was posted. Instead they shackled the two youths and took them off to Latrun.
MAYOR OF PETACH TIKVAH CHARGES ANTI-JEWISH ACTS BY LOCAL POLICE
Meanwhile, charges that the police of Petach Tikvah are engaging in anti-Jewish acts were made today by the mayor in a letter to the district commander. He cited 54 incidents in which the police shouted anti-Jewish slogans and he demanded that measures be taken against policemen who paint swastikas on shop windows, walls, doors and signboards.
The mayor urged that punishment be severe because he said that conduct of the policemen was embittering the populace. “As the mayor of a Hebrew town in Palestine, I am not ready to accept dishonor,” he declared in the letter.
In Jerusalem, the bus companies were considering a demand by their drivers to finish their runs early in the evening instead of at midnight because late at night armed drunken soldiers continually attack the buses. Curtailing the bus service would cut off thousands of suburbanites from evening transportation.
Troops using mine detectors yesterday uncovered a large cache of grenades in a shed in Tiberias belonging to a Jew. A mine exploded today under a military truck travelling between Nathanya and Kfar Vitkin, but there were no casualties. Cars equipped with special mine detectors used in the Libyan campaign sweep the roads twice daily in an attempt to uncover mines planted during the dusk-to-dawn curfew hours.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
