Israel's chief justice approves confession extracted under torture, denies appeal

Israel's Supreme Court President Esther Hayut rejected an appeal by a defendant convicted of murder solely on the basis of confessions extracted under torture. Barring a pardon, Amiram Ben Uliel will serve three life sentences, plus an additional 20 years, for three deaths resulting from an arson attack on a family home in an Arab village in 2015, despite both the torture and major inconsistencies in the government's evidence. 

Jewish Section

Much  like the Soviet Union's Jewish Section (Yevsektsiya), which targeted Jews with a mission statement calling for the “destruction of traditional Jewish life,” the modern secular State of Israel's equivalent of the FBI (i.e. Shabak) has a Jewish Section which also specifically targets traditional Jews, even infiltrating traditional Jewish communities. The section's overzealous persecution of the traditional community has led to a notoriously low conviction rate, as it pushes ahead with arrests in the absence of evidence. 

Former Knesset member Moshe Feiglin says that the secular government does so to obfuscate the source of terror. Israel suffers from an inordinate amount of terror attacks even by today's standards. If all of it were to be traced to the Marxist-Leninist PLO and its subsidiary, the Palestinian Authority, Israelis might demand a crackdown on the PLO. The Jewish Section steps in to blur the picture, making it appear that terror is random. In the words of Shalom Pollack, a student of Feiglin,

Amiram is the perfect person to be used to prove that terror is not a "sectoral problem". . . . The elites would like to describe terror as a social malaise and not a national threat. Anyone can be a terrorist. Nothing Arab or Jewish about it. May [God] save Amiram and his poor family from the clutches of evil. [Emphasis added].

Ticking bomb?

Rather than checking Shabak's impetuous Jewish Section, Israel's judiciary condones its actions without even requesting Shabak's justification, as The Jewish Press lays it out in this case.

It was a Supreme Court judge, Yoram Danziger, who sanctioned the torture of the two defendants [Ben Uliel and his friend], claiming there was a “ticking bomb”. (Israeli law permits “enhanced interrogation” if there is a high level of confidence that information provided will prevent an impending terrorist attack.) However, the Shabak never mentioned any suspicions of a plot being hatched to burn down another Arab home.

36  hours

Ben Uliel's lawyer, Avigdor Feldman, broke down the smoke and mirrors the Supreme Court employed to justify relying on the alleged “ticking bomb” confession.

Confessions provided either during torture or immediately afterward are considered invalid by the courts; the courts draw an imaginary line at 36 hours post-torture, considering confessions made beyond that point as admissible. However, nothing changed for Ben Uliel after 36 hours had passed. He was still in the hands of the Shabak, still denied all contact with the outside world, and still prevented from seeing a lawyer.

A judicial order permitted witholding a lawyer, but with no real justification provided. The only reason was the desire to ensure that a lawyer could not explain to my client that while confessions given during torture would not be considered admissible, those given 36 hours afterward would be accepted as valid by the courts. As if some magical memory-erasing device had been used to wipe all recollection of the torture from his mind." [Emphases added].

Holes in confession

Israel's Supreme Court ignored the lack of reliability of all forced confessions. 

Frontline News previously reported on the following significant mismatches between Uliel's confession and the evidence gathered.

• Ben Uliel’s confession has him acting alone while eyewitnesses claim to have seen two arsonists each throwing firebombs. Additionally, two different sets of graffiti, in two different handwritings, were seen at the arson scene;
• An expert handwriting analysis found “a complete lack of similarity” between Ben Uliel’s handwriting and both sets of graffiti;
• A shoe print analysis found that neither of the two different and very fresh shoe prints at the arson scene belonged to Ben Uliel;
• Ben Uliel’s confession is contradicted by the timeline indicated by the evidence;
• Ben Uliel’s confession is contradicted by a confession extracted from a different person which was extracted using similar torture techniques and then disregarded; and
• Videotape of Ben Uliel’s alleged reenactment of the crime shows him to be “clearly unfamiliar with the scene.” The videotaping even had to be stopped multiple times to instruct him on how to reenact the arson when his statements didn't match the evidence.
• The confession does not explain why the very family that was victimized in the arson attack has been involved in an inter-family dispute resulting in at least seven arson attacks before and after the arson with which Ben Uliel was charged.

Self-awareness?

The legal aid organization supporting Ben Uliel, Honenu, pointed out the irony of Justice Hayut permitting torture at the very time that she has been publicly opposing efforts to end her court's ability to thwart the will of the electorate. The new government is planning legislation to stop the Supreme Court from invalidating laws passed by the elected members of the Knesset (Israeli parliament) and to transfer control of the panel that appoints new judges from Supreme Court judges to elected politicians. 

Hayut alleges that putting control of the nation's laws in the hands of elected officials is anti-democratic and threatening to human rights, but failed to explain how allowing torture enhances human rights. In the words of Honenu:

Hayut, like all her friends who proclaim themselves protectors of human rights, has made a mockery of the human rights of all the downtrodden of society with her support of torture when it is used to force those being interrogated to confess to crimes — just like in a third world country.

Precisely now, when everyone is talking about the Court as the 'protector of human rights,' Hayut has reminded us of the lies and deceit behind these fine words. When it comes to a Jew with a beard and peyot [sidelocks], the Court despises his human rights and tramples upon them.

Previous Prime Minister Naftali Bennett summed up what Hayut is really fighting for:

in recent years the Supreme Court has placed itself above the legislature instead of next to it. In recent years, the Supreme Court has deviated from its authority and has begun to disqualify laws with too light a hand. In recent months, the Supreme Court has overturned laws and Knesset actions at an unprecedented rate.

Three times the Supreme Court overturned the outline for removing infiltrators from Israel, and the Supreme Court overturned the canceling of the residency of Hamas members in East Jerusalem.The third apartment law was disqualified; the biannual budget law; the Regulation Law is frozen; the draft law was canceled; the corporation law is frozen and more.The Supreme Court is not supposed to intervene to determine if a law is appropriate or not; that's the Knesset's authority.

I don't particularly like some of the laws, but the Knesset is the sovereign. Members of the Knesset were elected by millions of Israeli citizens, and the Supreme Court cannot annul the will of the people just because it does not see eye-to-eye with a law.

The Supreme Court is entitled to intervene only when it comes to the tyranny of the majority, governmental tyranny vis-à-vis the individual, and this is not the case. . . .

Inexplicably, though, Bennet now opposes the judicial reform legislation, seeking to water it down.

The full current proposal, as it currently stands, is dangerous. It will harm the foundations of the State of Israel, its economy and its citizens . . .

What Shabak did

The court euphemistically referred to the torture as "enhanced interrogation”. Israel’s judiciary placed a gag order on Ben Uliel and his lawyer, preventing them from identifying most of the means of torture implemented against him. It was revealed, though, that intelligence agents bound his feet to a chair and his hands behind his back while repeatedly bending him backwards, causing him extraordinary pain that would garner a false confession within seconds from almost anyone, as explained in the English translation below the video.

Translation: What does it take to cause anyone to admit to anything, and what is the “recipe” for a predetermined confession? It's very simple and has only a few “ingredients”: 1. zip ties, 2. a chair, 3. patience. Take the defendant and seat him on the chair. Bind his feet to the chair and bind his hands behind his back. Bend him backwards so that he can't get up.

If you encounter a particularly strong defendant who refuses to break down, repeat the procedure several times, and you will certainly receive the desired results. This recipe was successfully used in the Duma case and in other cases. It doesn't take much for someone to break under torture and say whatever the interrogator wants him to say.

Torture in Israel

Please see our earlier article on the government of Israel's torture of its citizens.

Friends of Israel concerned over ruling allowing confessions extracted under torture