Shin Bet holds woman for funneling terror cash to sons

The mother of two security detainees was arrested on suspicion of providing them financial support, the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) revealed on Monday.

Hayat Fakir, a resident of Jaljulya, an Israeli town near Kfar Saba, was arrested on July 17 with “money in her possession given to her by terrorist groups and intended, among other things, for her two sons, Fares and Adam Faqi, two security detainees awaiting trial,” the agency said.

Adam and Fares Faqi were arrested by the Shin Bet in May 2017 and charged with serious offenses connected to an alleged plan to assassinate an army officer in revenge for the killing of senior Hamas operative Mazen Fuqaha in the Gaza Strip on March 24.

While Israel has denied any role in Fuqaha’s death, Hamas blamed Israel and publicly executed three men on May 25 convicted of collaborating with Israel to kill Fuqaha.

During the Shin Bet’s investigation into the alleged Faqi plot it was discovered that Adam Faqi had been recruited into Hamas by another brother, Muhammad, while in the Gaza Strip to attend a family wedding in 2014. He is said to have undergone small arms training with senior Hamas figure Hassan Jabari, the brother of Ahmed Jabari, the former head of Hamas’s Izzadin Kassam Brigade who was slain in an Israel Air Force targeted killing during Operational Pillar of Defense in 2012.

According to a statement released by Shin Bet in June, the Faqi case “illustrates the serious danger posed by the connection between the criminal world and terrorism.”

The investigation also showed how Hamas was “exploiting Israel’s humanitarian policy” toward the Gaza Strip, referring to family visits and to Gazans needing medical treatment in Israel, in order to advance terrorist plots, the agency added.