2005: Israeli national arrested in Trinidad threatens to go on a hunger strike

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Israeli national arrested in Trinidad threatens to go on a hunger strike

by Stephen Cummings
Caribbean Net News Trinidad Correspondent
Email: http://www.caribbeannetnews.com/2005/11 ... tens.shtml

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Narco cell raids Mumbai night club, 249 held

October 06, 2008 12:31 IST
Last Updated: October 06, 2008 12:44 IST



Eight alleged drug peddlers have been arrested and 241 persons detained for attending a rave party following a raid at a night club, Mumbai police said on Monday.

Acting on a tip-off that drugs were being peddled at the 'Bombay 72 Degree East' night club, the Anti-Narcotics Cell of the city police raided the establishment late Sunday night, police said.

A woman and an Israeli national were among the eight arrested, they said.

Narcotics like LSD drops, Ecstasy and cannabis were recovered from them, police said.

The others detained will undergo medical tests to confirm their consumption of narcotics at the restaurant.

Those detained include Hindi film actor Shakti Kapoor's son, Sidhant, who was allegedly working as a disc jockey at the night club.

http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/oct/06rave.htm

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Antwerp Facets - 17 April 2007 › Israeli arrested in connection with ABN AMRO theft in Antwerp
 

[AFNS] ANTWERP, BELGIUM 17-04-2007 – The prosecutor's office in Antwerp has confirmed that Eliser Mishali, an Israeli national, has been arrested in connection with a theft on March 5 of  reportedly $28 million worth of diamonds from safety boxes at the branch of ABN AMRO Bank in the Antwerp diamond district.

Mishali, 47, was detained as he was trying to leave Frankfurt, Germany, and the Belgian authorities are now seeking his extradition. The police in Antwerp hope that he will shed light on the whereabouts of the main suspect in the robbery, as well as the location of the missing diamonds. The arrested man is considered an accomplice, and had spent the time since the robbery traveling in Germany and the Netherlands.

According to media reports, the main suspect in the case had presented himself at the bank as an Argentinean national about a year before the robbery, and was considered a regular customer. It is know believed that he was using a a passport that had been stolen in Israel several years ago. According to some media reports, he is 55 years of age and also is believed to be Israeli. He still may be acting under the assumed name of Carlos Flomenbaum.  

A service of the Antwerp Facets News Service (AFNS). Article may be reproduced provided that credit is given to AFNS.

http://www.hrd.be/index.php?id=975

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Monday, January 26, 2009
Israeli National Held In Philippine Airport Over Bomb Joke
Authorities arrested an Israeli national over a bomb joke in Mactan Cebu International Airport Sunday. Airport police nabbed Israeli national Eliav Gaoli for joking that he has a bomb hidden in his shoes. Gaoli was already on his way back to Manila with his cousin Naor Nariski when he joked about carrying a bomb in his shoes.


Eliav Gaoli
He cracked the joke to an airport employee while his shoes were passing through security inspection through an X-ray machine. Gaoli and his cousin were already going through the final checking when authorities made the arrest. The Israeli will undergo a medical check up before charges are filed against him. Goali said he has no idea that such jokes are strictly prohibited under the law.

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Israeli Fugitive Arrested in $500,000 Auto Fraud Scam

August 28, 2007

A Sherman Oaks, Calif., man has been arrested for insurance fraud, grand theft, identity theft, and federal charges, the California Department of Insurance reported. Moshe "Sanny" Assoulin, 35, was arrested in Israel on Aug. 19, 2007 by Israeli National Police. Assoulin is an Israeli national who grew up in California's San Fernando Valley.

A warrant for Assoulin's arrest was issued in October 2005, following the results of an investigation by the CDI. The investigation revealed multiple fraudulent automobile insurance claims were allegedly submitted to car rental and insurance companies by Assoulin and co-conspirators. Nine defendants have pleaded guilty to various insurance fraud related charges in connection with this case. In May 2005, Assoulin was awaiting sentencing for federal charges when he became aware of CDI's insurance fraud investigation. At that point, Assoulin fled to Israel.

The CDI Fraud Division's 2005 investigation revealed that from 2000 to early 2002 Assoulin participated in a scam in which fraudulent insurance claims were submitted to car rental and insurance companies. Under the alleged scheme, a person would rent a vehicle from a car rental company and return it a day or two later with slight damage. The renter would report that he or she had accidentally struck a parked unoccupied vehicle. Another person would then contact the car rental company as the owner of the parked unoccupied vehicle, and submit a claim for property damages. The same vehicles with the same damages were used repeatedly in multiple claims.

One of the vehicles, a 1997 Mercedes Benz SL600, was used in 10 claims, and various insurance companies paid more than $100,000 in settlements for alleged damages to the vehicle. The potential loss to the various car rental and insurance companies is estimated at nearly $500,000. The National Insurance Crime Bureau, as well as multiple car rental and insurance companies, assisted in the investigation.

The CDI Fraud Division and the Drug Enforcement Administration jointly submitted to Israel a request for the arrest and extradition of Assoulin through the US Department of Justice Office of International Affairs. The request was reviewed by the Israeli Ministry of Justice, and an Israeli arrest warrant was issued. On August 19, 2007, Israeli National Police located and arrested Assoulin. The Los Angeles County District Attorney is prosecuting this case.

Source: CDI

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Two suspected Mossad agents arrested in New Zealand
By Ellis Shuman  April 18, 2004
 
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Two Israeli citizens were arrested a month ago in Auckland after they tried to obtain a forged New Zealand passport, the New Zealand Herald reported on Saturday. The paper said that the two men were apparently Israeli secret service agents. New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark said her government had raised the issue with Israel. Israeli Foreign Ministry officials said the two men had been arrested on criminal charges.

Israeli diplomats have begun efforts to minimize a potentially serious diplomatic row with New Zealand. The Israeli Embassy dispatched a senior diplomat to New Zealand to deal with the arrests of the two Israeli citizens. According to the New Zealand media reports, officials in the country fear that the Mossad is enabling its agents to travel around the world with forged New Zealand travel documents.

"What the Government takes extremely seriously is any action which sets out to challenge the integrity of the New Zealand passport system and we will act in any way we can to protect the reputation of the New Zealand passport," Clark told New Zealand's National Radio yesterday.

According to the Herald report, Uri Kelman, 30, and Eli Cara, 50, were detained after attempting to obtain a fake New Zealand passport. Another suspect in the affair, the report added, Ze'ev Barkan, 37, had left the country. A fourth unidentified man is also suspected of involvement in the affair.

Appearing before the Auckland District Court on Saturday, Kelman and Cara denied three joint charges including attempting to obtain a New Zealand passport and participating in an organized crime group to obtain a false passport. Their lawyer appeared on television stating that no charges of belonging to an Israeli intelligence organization had been brought against his two clients.

Outside the court, Cara denied being a member of the Israeli secret service, the Herald said. Asked if there had been a misunderstanding, he said, "I think so."

Cara, who says he is a Sydney-based travel agent, has traveled in and out of New Zealand 24 times since October 2000.

Cara was arrested by police at a cafe as he awaited delivery of the forged passport. Kelman was was arrested after he was seen walking away from another point, throwing a cellphone into bushes, the Herald reported.

Israeli officials have refused to issue public statements on the arrests, saying in response only that the men had been detained on criminal charges and that the matter was under investigation.

The officials expressed the concern that the arrests would lead to a potentially serious diplomatic row between Israel and New Zealand.

There have been previous cases when Mossad agents were arrested while traveling with forged foreign documents. In 1997, Mossad agents were caught using Canadian passports during a failed assassination attempt on Hamas's political leader Khaled Mashaal in Amman, Jordan.

In 2000, a Mossad operative was handed a suspended sentence after being accused of espionage and repeated use of false identity documents in Switzerland.

http://web.israelinsider.com/bin/en.jsp ... ho=Article^l3534&enZone=Diplomacy&enVersion=0&

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Israeli cocaine ring rounded up in Lima
By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Dec 8, 2008, 00:18

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(WMR) -- Peruvian police have rounded up an Israeli-led cocaine smuggling ring, according to the Peruvian Ministry of the Interior and Reuters.

On December 2, Peruvian police confiscated over a half ton of cocaine bound for Europe and Israel from Lima and Chorillos. In October, more sizable amounts of cocaine from the same criminal syndicate were seized by police in the Bahamas and Spain.

Peruvian police believe the cocaine ring's leader is Israeli national Moris Abdelhak, aka "The Welder," who was arrested last nobth in Peru. Abdelhak, whose residence is Kiryat Yam, Israel, specialized in hiding cocaine in machinery that was then sent to phony companies either via land route to Chile and then by sea to Europe and Haifa or by air directly from Jorge Chavez International Airport in Lima. Some of the cocaine shipped to Israel was transported via an additional smuggling route to Jordan.

Four Peruvian citizens have also been arrested in the cocaine bust in Peru. Israeli police are still looking for the top ring leader, Moshe El-Garbli, a former soccer player from Magdim who uses the name "The Referee." Last month, Israeli police arrested 10 Israelis in an investigation of the cocaine ring that shipped the drugs into Haifa in shipping containers.

On October 11, 2006, Estonian police arrested four Israelis tied to the cocaine smuggling ring. Nahum Yaron Kahana, Meir Shushan, Shimon Yaloz, and Moshe Moris Benyamin were arrested for trying to smuggle cocaine into Tallinn hidden in a gearwheel shipped from Lima. Benyamin, 63, reportedly suffered a "brain stroke" while in custody and he was released to relatives who took him back to Israel.

Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report.

Copyright © 2008 WayneMadenReport.com

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Israeli intelligence scam artists continue to ply their 'trade'
By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Jan 15, 2009, 00:20

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(WMR) -- Israeli "art students" and mall kiosk vendors, who have been operating in Western nations since a year before the 9/11 attacks on the United States, continue to ply their trade, according to information received by WMR.

Last month, police in New South Wales, Australia arrested the leader of an Israeli "art student" ring who was selling mass-produced paintings from China as valuable artwork from Israel. The Israeli man arrested, age 23, fit the profile of a number of Israeli "art students" rounded up, detained, and deported by U.S. authorities in the months prior to 9/11. The "art students" were casing federal offices, military installations, and the homes of federal agents and officials.

The Israeli was arrested by police in Wamberal on Australia's eastern central coast. Fifty Chinese-made oil paintings were found in the Israeli's Mitsubishi station wagon. He was attempting to sell the paintings for between 500 and 1,000 Australian dollars. The Israelis in Australia visited a number of homes and claimed they were university students from Israel. The Israeli arrested lived in Sydney's Bondi Beach neighborhood. The Israeli was released on bail and ordered to appear in Gosford Local Court on January 27.

WMR has also leaned of other Israeli mall kiosks around the country that hired aggressive Israeli young men and women who badger customers and ask personal questions. Israeli mall kiosks engaged in the aggressive sales practices have been set up at the North Shore Mall in Peabody, Massachusetts, and Northeast Mall in Hurst, Texas, a Dallas suburb. The mall kiosks in Peabody sell Israeli hand cream and nail files. The kiosk in Hurst has a male overseer, about 45 years old, who lives in the Bahamas.

Many of the Israeli mall vendors claim ignorance when told by customers that Israeli mall kiosks were identified as Mossad front operations in a Fox News report. More incredibly, some Israelis feign ignorance when the term "911" is used. They claim not to know what the term means.

Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report.

Copyright © 2008 WayneMadenReport.com

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish ... 4099.shtml

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

14:26 - 04.04.2005
Bulgaria Arrests Cocaine Smuggling Suspect Wanted in Turkey

SOFIA (bnn)- Bulgaria has arrested an Israeli national wanted in Turkey to serve 24 years in prison for drug traffic, a senior police official said Monday.

http://www.bgnewsnet.com/story.php?lang=en&sid=19918

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Egypt jails Israeli tourist on drugs charge   
   
[ Thursday, 18 December 2008 ]
   
"Surveillance of our borders is tight," security official
Egypt jails Israeli tourist on drugs charge
   
Drug Smuggling across borders

Taba, EGYPT (Marwa Awad)

An Israeli on a short visit to a resort in Egypt's Aqaba Gulf will be staying quite a while longer after he was found guilty of smuggling 500 grams of hashish on Thursday.

51-year-old Israeli national Ben Yussef Isaac, a tennis trainer was convicted by an Egyptian court for five years and a fine of 10,000 pounds ($2000) after he was arrested at the Movenpick Resort Taba Hotel by hotel security personnel who discovered 500 grams of hashish in his bag.

"We routinely check foreign visitors and nationals who come here because incidents of smuggling are numerous," a security official, who did not disclose his name told AlArabiya.net.

Taba, Egypt's busiest border crossing with Israel, is a major transit route for migrants, asylum-seekers and drug smugglers. The conviction is the latest in drug smuggling trend that plagues Egyptian/Israeli border crossings.

"He told authorities the drug was for personal use, but the amount is too huge for personal use." Mukhtar Madi from the prosecutions department in Taba told AlArabiya.net. "It is definitely a case of drug trade." he added.

Penalties for possession, trafficking or use of illegal drugs in Egypt are severe, and convicted offenders get long jail sentences and heavy fines while those in the drug industry could end up with capital punishment.
Top

Drug Smuggling across borders
" Our efforts to keep border crossings clear from smuggling are evident. Security officials carry out routine investigations to ensure the safety and clearance of anything illegal. "
Harun Hasan, head of Securities in southern Sinai

Official at the Sinai Court in Egypt told AlArabiya.net that smuggling drugs across the 250-km (155 miles) Egyptian Israeli border is a constant problem.

Last February saw the sentencing of two Israelis in absentia for five years as well after they were caught with hashish as they drove from Israel to Sinai.

The Jewish state regularly accuses Egypt of not doing enough to stop the entry into Israel or the Gaza Strip of everything from arms and drugs to illegal immigrants.

In June, Israel handed over to Egyptian authorities six Bedouins who were suspected of drug trafficking.

However Harun Hasan, head of Securities in southern Sinai says surveillance is tight on the border.

"Our efforts to keep border crossings clear from smuggling are evident. Security officials carry out routine investigations to ensure the safety and clearance of anything illegal," he told AlArabiya.net.

Egypt is the first Arab nation to sign a peace treaty with Israel in 1979, after which the Israeli-occupied Sinai was handed back to Egypt after the 1973 war. The peninsula remains a popular tourist destination for Israelis.

http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2008/12/18/62289.html

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Sep 9, 2007 12:15 pm US/Eastern
Israeli Neo-Nazi Gang Arrested
JERUSALEM (AP) ―

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    Israeli police said Sunday they have cracked a cell of young Israeli neo-Nazis accused in a string of attacks on foreign workers, religious Jews, drug addicts and gays.

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In a case that would seem unthinkable in the Jewish state, police said Sunday they have cracked a cell of young Israeli neo-Nazis accused in a string of attacks on foreign workers, religious Jews, drug addicts and gays.

Eight immigrants from the former Soviet Union have been arrested in recent days in connection with at least 15 attacks, and a ninth fled the country, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said, in the first such known cell to be discovered in Israel.

All the suspects are in their late teens or early 20s and have Israeli citizenship, Rosenfeld said.

"The level of violence was outrageous," Maj. Revital Almog, who investigated the case, told Israel's Army Radio.

A court decided Sunday to keep the young men in custody. They covered their faces with their shirts during the hearing, revealing their tattooed arms, and did not comment.

News of the arrests came as a shock in Israel, which was founded nearly 60 years ago as a refuge for Jews in the wake of the Nazi Holocaust and remains a most sensitive subject. Any forms of anti-Semitism around the world outrage Israelis, and the discovery of such violence in the country's midst made the front pages of newspapers and dominated talk on morning radio shows.

The gang documented its activities on film and in photographs. Israeli TV stations showed grainy footage of people lying helpless on floors while several people kicked them, and of a man getting hit from behind on the head with an empty bottle.

Police found knives, spiked balls, explosives and other weapons in the suspects' possession, Rosenfeld said. One photo that was seized showed one suspect holding an M16 rifle in one hand and in the other, a sign reading "Heil Hitler," he added.

Police discovered the skinhead ring after investigating the desecration of two synagogues that were sprayed with swastikas in the central Israeli city of Petah Tikva more than a year ago, Rosenfeld said.

Police computer experts have determined they maintained contacts with neo-Nazi groups abroad, and materials seized include a German-language video about neo-Nazis in the U.S.

The group planned its attacks, and its targets were foreign workers from Asia, drug addicts, homosexuals, punks and Jews who wore skullcaps. In one case they discussed planning a murder, Rosenfeld said, without providing details.

Some of the victims filed official complaints with police, and other victims were identified after police viewed the films and photos.

In the past, there have been only isolated cases of neo-Nazi activity in Israel. "This is the first time that we've ... arrested such a large number of individuals who are part of an organized neo-Nazi group," Rosenfeld said.

Under Israeli law, a person can claim citizenship if a parent or grandparent has Jewish roots. Authorities say that formulation allowed many Soviets with questionable ties to Judaism to immigrate here after the Soviet Union disintegrated. About 1 million Soviets moved here in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Rosenfeld said all the suspects had "parents or grandparents who were Jewish in one way or another."

Israel doesn't specifically have a hate crimes law, and suspects in past cases have been tried as Holocaust deniers, he said.

The Anti-Defamation League, a U.S.-based group that fights anti-Semitism, condemned the neo-Nazi cell, but urged Israelis not to stigmatize the entire Russian immigrant community based on the acts of what appeared to be a marginal group.

"The suspicion that immigrants to Israel could have been acting in praise of Nazis and Hitler is an anathema to the Jewish state and is to be repelled," the statement read. "The tragic irony in this is that they would have been chosen for annihilation by the Nazis they strive to emulate."

Amos Herman, an official with the semiofficial Jewish Agency, which works on behalf of the government to encourage immigration to Israel, said the phenomenon was not representative of the Russian immigration.

He called the gang a group of frustrated, disgruntled youths trying to strike at the nation's most sensitive core.

"We thought that it would never happen here, but it has and we have to deal with it," he said.

(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

http://kdka.com/national/neo.Nazis.Israel.2.288961.html

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Israeli wanted on terror charges detained in Moscow
   
09:41    |    28/ 08/ 2007
   
Print version

MOSCOW, August 28 (RIA Novosti) - Russian law enforcement and Interpol officials said Tuesday they arrested a 45-year-old retired Israeli Army colonel wanted in Colombia for terrorism at Moscow's Domodedovo airport.

The Israeli national, who has his own business, was detained at customs control intending to board the Moscow-Tel Aviv flight. His name has not been disclosed.

"The foreign national has been working for some time in Russia and using a passport in a different name," a police source said.

In 1989, a Colombian court sentenced the Israeli national to 10 years and eight months imprisonment in absentia for terrorism, and he was put on an international wanted list.

According to Colombian law enforcement agencies, in the late 1980s, the suspect took part in training gunmen for drug cartels at an illegal training camp based in the South American country. During the investigation he fled the country.

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20070828/75271278.html

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

U.S. Department of Justice
Drug Enforcement Administration
Washington, D.C. November 22, 2000

INTERNATIONAL MDMA (Ecstasy) SYNDICATE DISMANTLED

Federal Agents of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Division (IRS/CID), and the U.S. Customs Service (USCS) have culminated an 18-month investigation targeting a multi-ethnic, transnational MDMA (ecstasy) and cocaine distribution organization after enforcement action by Dutch police authorities on November 22, 2000, in the Netherlands. More than 22 suspects in four U.S. cities and in four European countries have been arrested to date. Additional arrests are anticipated in both the U.S. and overseas.

The investigation, known as Operation RED TIDE, was coordinated by a Los Angeles based federal task force comprised of agents from the DEA, FBI, IRS/CID, and USCS, and strongly supported by several local and state law enforcement agencies. To date, arrests have taken place in Los Angeles, California; Boston, Massachusetts; Las Vegas, Nevada; Phoenix, Arizona; Anchorage, Alaska; Salt Lake City, Utah; London, England; Frankfurt, Germany; Milan, Italy; and Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

According to DEA Administrator Donnie R. Marshall, "Operation Red Tide is a textbook example of the new multi-agency, multi-national law enforcement cooperation needed to thwart organized crime in the 21st century. Even though drug trafficking organizations are increasingly sophisticated and multi-national, they are becoming no match for the kind of law enforcement coalitions we have forged."

FBI Director Louis J. Freeh, observed, "This investigation stands as a shining example of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working with the Drug Enforcement Administration, and other law enforcement professionals around the world, to bring to justice those pedaling the dangerous 'party drug' know as 'ecstasy' regardless of where the suspects are in the world."

On July 22, 2000, a team of DEA and FBI agents provided information to the USCS about a load of MDMA that had been shipped to Los Angeles from Paris, France. As a result, 1,096 pounds (2.1 million tablets) of MDMA, the largest single seizure of the drug in history, were seized by USCS agents from a commercial air carrier in Los Angeles. The head of the organization, Tamer Adel Ibrahim immediately fled the U.S. after the seizure, but was quickly traced to Mexico by the DEA/FBI team. Investigators learned that Ibrahim was coordinating a multi-hundred kilogram shipment of cocaine from Mexico to Europe, as well as the shipment of an additional 1.2 million tablets (approximately 600 pounds) of MDMA from the Netherlands to Los Angeles, via Mexico.

In mid-September, Ibrahim traveled from Mexico to Amsterdam, the Netherlands, where he planned to further coordinate the 1.2 million-tablet shipment of MDMA to Los Angeles. A co-conspirator, Joseph Gilboa, had traveled from Israel to meet with Ibrahim and other members of the syndicate to facilitate the shipment. Gilboa and Ibrahim along with others were arrested shortly thereafter and the 1.2 million tablets of MDMA were seized by the Dutch National Police.

Dutch officials continued their investigation over the next three months as the DEA/FBI team continued to funnel leads to that agency. On November 22, 2000, the Dutch National Police arrested seven co-conspirators, executed search warrants at 17 locations and seized several hundred thousand US dollars, as well as several hundred thousand Dutch guilders.

To date, 3,127 pounds of ecstasy tablets linked to the syndicate have been seized in the U.S., and elsewhere around the globe. Those arrested face federal charges for their involvement in the enterprise. According to court documents, all of those arrested are alleged to have been directly involved in the unlawful distribution of ecstasy and cocaine.

The investigation targeting the transnational MDMA and cocaine trafficking syndicate was a cooperative effort by the U.S. law enforcement agencies, as well as the Dutch National Police/Regional Team South, Mexico's Fiscalia Especializad Para La Atencion De Delitos (FEADS), the Israeli National Police, the German Federal Police (Bundes Kriminal Amt), the Cologne Germany Police Department, the Duissburg Germany Police Department, the Italian National Police and the French National Police.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, the Downey California Police Department, the California Highway Patrol and the Los Angeles IMPACT Task Force also worked closely with federal authorities in California throughout the investigation.

Marshall added, "Operation Red Tide is extremely important because DEA views MDMA (ecstasy) as a new threat with a potential to cause great damage, especially to America's youth. One of the biggest problems with ecstasy is that its dangers are underrated by our young people. Many using ecstasy at rave parties and clubs are unaware of its dangers including a rapid pulse, severe dehydration, memory loss, and even death. The success of Operation Red Tide has ensured that a large volume of ecstasy that would have made it into the hands of our youth never hit the streets."

http://www.usembassy.it/file2000_11/alia/a0112704.htm

[CrackSmokeRepublican]

Israeli Chabad leaders arrested

By · November 26, 2007

Israeli police arrested the leader of the Young Chabad movement.

Yosef Aharonov and three others are accused of embezzlement, tax evasion and money laundering. The arrests and a Nov. 13 raid on the community of Kfar Chabad follow an eight-month investigation by the Israel Tax Authority and the Central District Fraud Squad.

Arkady Gaydamak, an Israeli-Russian billionaire and a potential Jerusalem mayoral candidate, is accused of donating $256,000 to the money-laundering facilities allegedly run out of Kfar Chabad, according to Israel's Channel 10. He and other prominent businessmen are currently under investigation.

Young Chabad, also known as Lubavitch Youth, is a nonprofit organization and one of the more prominent Chabad institutions in Israel. It has a budget of about $7.7 million a year, including allocations from the Israeli government.

Yosef George Segal, a Chabad employee who was accused more than a year ago by Young Chabad officials of embezzling $4.5 million from the organization, also was arrested.

" Like Chabad-Lubavitch offices everywhere, the Chabad Youth Organization in Israel is fiscally independent. However, its noble social service programs and educational outreach are legendary and a source of pride to the Jewish people everywhere," read a statement from the umbrella organization of the worldwide Chabad Lubavitch movement.

"Clearly, every individual is instructed by the Torah to uphold the laws of his/her land, and this is, of course, a basic principle of Chabad Lubavitch operations.We are confident, therefore, that the authorities will receive full cooperation in their efforts and that, ultimately, the results will be satisfactory. "

http://jta.org/news/article/2007/11/26/ ... adaharonov