How the occupation seeped into Israel's judicial system
Case 4000 has exposed the use of detention by Israeli police and court officers in Israel to pressure suspects into breaking, a tactic typically used by the Shin Bet on Palestinians in the occupied territories.
![ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS Israeli border policemen detain a Palestinian protester during clashes near Jerusalem's Old City December 26, 2015. Palestinians protested demanding that they be given the bodies of their brethren who have been killed during the latest wave of violence with Israel. REUTERS/Ammar Awad - GF10000276454](/sites/default/files/styles/article_hero_medium/public/almpics/2018/02/RTX203FY.jpg/RTX203FY.jpg?h=a5ae579a&itok=--p2Tivh)
On Feb. 25, Channel 10 revealed that a judge and a state investigator had coordinated via text messaging to extend the detention of suspects arrested in connection with Case 4000, the investigation involving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s relations with the telecommunications tycoon Shaul Elovitch. For many, the revelation immediately brought to mind the findings of a recent Amnesty International report, “Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, 2017/2018.”
In fact, it is hard to ignore the similarities between Amnesty’s report — which determined that Israel is holding hundreds of Palestinians in administrative detention for long periods without trial — and the ease with which arrests were made in Israel by Israel Police in the Netanyahu-Elovitch case. The “storm of arrests” resulting from Case 4000 has finally put this item on Israel’s public agenda.