A young Israeli convicted of consorting with the enemy threatened in a Haifa district court today that the court and the entire Israeli regime will one day have to face trial just as the Nazis did at Nuremberg. The statement was made by Ram Livneh, son of Communist MK Avraham Levenbraum, after he and co-defendant. Mali Lerman were found guilty of having had contacts with an E1 Fatah agent.
Livneh and Lerman, an immigrant from South America, were tried together with eight Arabs accused of membership in a Syrian-directed Arab-Jewish spy and sabotage ring uncovered last year. Four other Israeli Jews and more than 20 Arabs have been convicted at earlier trials in connection with the ring’s activities.
Lerman, who was permitted to make a statement after the guilty verdict was announced, stunned the courtroom when he declared that “A day will come when those responsible for this trial, just as those responsible for other crimes of the oppressive regime, will have to face court for the crimes they committed under the disguise of laws that they have made and accepted against the interests of the nation.”
He said that when they are tried, “no one will be able to claim that he acted according to the law or that he acted under orders as was claimed by the Nazis in the Nuremburg trial or the murderers of Kafer Kassem.” Kafer Kassem, an Arab village, was the site of the massacre of 48 persons by Israeli border police for curfew violations in 1956. Those responsible were tried and sentenced to prison terms.
District court Judge Emmanuel Slonim responded angrily to Livneh’s remarks. He said such threats have never been heard in an Israeli court. When Livneh rose to reply, he was silenced by another judge on the panel, Avraham Friedman.
Livneh and Lerman were not accused of membership in the spy ring of which two other convicted Jews, Ehud Adiv and Dan Vered were leaders. They were tried together with the eight Arab members because the authorities thought the two cases dove-tailed. Judge Slonim will pronounce sentence Sunday.
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