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| By israelinsider staff May 17, 2007 |
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Doctors Without Borders employee Masseb Bashir, apparently used the travel permit connected with his work for the organization to travel into Israel to collect information in an effort to plan the assassination of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
The 25-year-ond Palestinian from the Gaza Strip was charged Thursday by the Jerusalem District Court for gathering information to plan the assassination of the prime minister. He is being charged with conspiracy to commit a crime and contacting foreign agents.
Bashir was able to travel into the Jerusalem are freely because of a valid entry permit that was given to him because of his work with Doctors Without Borders. The organization is considered a humanitarian group by the UN and its members are allowed to pass freely through Israeli checkpoints.
Bashir was arrested on 19 April, and confessed to collecting the information for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). The group apparently trained Bashir and recruited him to gather intelligence top Israeli officials including MKs and Olmert.
Bashir researched the targets and realized that the MKs didn't live in Jerusalem, which was the only city to which his Doctors Without Borders permit would allow him entry. He thus turned his efforts to gathering intelligence on the security situation of Olmert's home in Jerusalem.
After visiting the site many times, Bashir told the PFLP that the security was too tight to allow a successful assassination attempt on the prime minister.
After this it was decided to assassinate David Be'eri, head of the Elad organization, instead. Elad is involved in buying Arab homes in Jerusalem's Old City.
Bashir returned to Israel many times to gather information on Be'eri. He was arrested during this last trip to Israel.
Regional head of Doctors Without Borders, Duncan Mclean, told Israel Radio, "I don't think embarrassed would be the right word. We are very sad for Bashir who has been working for us for almost six years. But we would like to make it very clear that we make a distinction between his professional work and what he does on his personal time in the sense that all our staff is hired for professional reasons and I don't think our organization can be held liable for every aspect of their life."
He said that all the organization's members are checked by the IDF for security reasons.
David Frankfurter, an Israel Insider columnist and expert on NGOs, remarked: "It is rare that one of the so-called 'human rights' NGOs that support Palestinian terror are openly exposed. NGO Monitor has reported the tendency of (Doctors without Borders) 'members [to] exploit this NGO for political goals including unsupported attacks on Israel in contradiction to the pledge to maintain independence from political powers.' Of particular concern to NGO Monitor is the specialist's diagnosis: Israeli actions degrade Palestinian healthcare. Of course, Palestinian violence and terror that make the protective actions necessary do not form part of the medical record. It seems that the mental and physical health of Israeli civilians does not even get an appointment."
Frankfurter adds: "Instead of their ongoing negative prognosis [on Israel], Medicins sans Frontiers would more usefully give a second opinion on the free medical treatment Israeli hospitals and doctors so frequently provide our Palestinian Arab neighbors."
Medicins sans Frontieres can be reached by phone at +41 (22) 849.84.00 and by fax at +41 (22) 8498404.
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