Israel could detain Jewish terrorists without trial

Occupied Jerusalem: Israel says it will detain without trial citizens suspected of political violence against Palestinians, government officials said on Sunday following a lethal West Bank arson attack blamed on Jewish terrorists.

The Israeli regime’s practice of “administration detention” is typically only applied to Palestinians and condemned internationally.

Friday’s torching of a Palestinian home killed a toddler and seriously hurt his parents and brother, causing an outcry abroad.

Graffiti in Hebrew reading “revenge” daubed at the site was consistent with past vandalism and other hate crimes by bands of young Jewish terrorists targeting Palestinians.

With no arrests yet made for the arson, some Israeli commentators on Sunday questioned the resolve of security services which, when responding to Palestinian attacks, often round up suspects en masse as part of accelerated investigations.

Such detainees are sometimes held without trial for months, a measure Israel says is required to prevent further violence in the absence of sufficient evidence to prosecute, or where going to court would risk exposing the identity of secret informants.

Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon, who oversees law and order in the West Bank, would now subject any Israelis arrested for the Douma arson or similar incidents in the future to “administrative detention,” his spokesman said.

“As always, each case of administrative detention will have to be approved by the courts, but by invoking this the minister is taking action consistent with his effort to exact the full measure of the law against these people,” the spokesman said.

Officials with Israel’s Shin Bet security service and Justice Ministry said they were aware of government plans to seek administrative detention for Israeli citizens.

According to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, 5,442 Palestinians were in detention without trial as of June. The measure, which foreign critics see as a blow to due process of the law, has seldom been imposed by Israel against its own citizens.

“To the best of my knowledge, there have been no instances of Israelis being held in administrative detention in recent years,” said B’Tselem spokeswoman Sarit Michaeli.