Old City woman gets 2.5 years for spying

Yasmin Jabar, a resident of Jerusalem’s Old City, was sentenced by the Jerusalem District Court to 30 months in prison on Sunday as part of a plea bargain conviction for spying for Hezbollah and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force.

Until her arrest in August 2020, she had been employed by the National Library at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Her relatively light sentence stemmed from the fact that she cut a deal and that she was caught before she had succeeded in causing significant security damage to Israel.

Since she was arrested on August 4, 2020, she could be released as early as February 2023 or possibly even earlier for good behavior.

The Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), Israel Police and other branches of the security apparatus announced in September 2020 how they uncovered Hezbollah’s recruitment of Jabar.

Hezbollah organizes conventions for young Palestinians in Lebanon, Turkey and other countries as a way of cultivating recruits from Israel and the West Bank, the security organizations said. Hezbollah seeks to form cells to help with intelligence collection and terrorist attacks, they said.

Jabar was identified by Hezbollah operatives when she attended a conference from early to mid-December 2015. She was also given a code name to disguise her identity.

During travels to Lebanon, operatives from the joint Hezbollah and IRGC Quds Force unit introduced Jabar to senior operatives named Ataiya Abu Samhadna and Mah Moud Mousa, who were known to have been involved in recruitment in Israel for terrorist activities.

The connection between Jabar and Samhadna even became romantic, including visits to Samhadna’s family’s home.

Jabar also met with three other senior operatives, but two men never provided her with their names, and one woman provided a likely false name.

After being recruited, Jabar maintained contact with Hezbollah and IRGC operatives through coded messages on social-media platforms and met with operatives in Turkey around February 18, 2016 and in 2018.

The operatives wanted Jabar to move to Turkey and to return there in April 2019, but she did not go after she became increasingly anxious about being caught.