Professors for a Strong Israel
Statement to the Press - 26 October 2002
Re: Police without identification tags
Professors for a Strong Israel has written to the Minister for Internal Security and to the Attorney General concerning the removal of ID tags by policemen. We included pictures of the destruction of Havat Gilad (Saturday, 19.10.02) that show a sizable number of police officers without their tags; we demanded that disciplinary action be taken against these officers and against whoever gave them orders to remove their tags in order to prevent identification; and we demanded that steps be taken to prevent recurrence of this phenomenon. The chairman of PSI observed in the letter that the absence of tags shows that those who gave the order to remove them doubted the legality of the operation into which they sent their men.
The letter further pointed out that:
- PSI rejects violence directed at soldiers and policemen, as well as unnecessary violence directed by the police at citizens;
- we reject any refusal to obey orders as a danger to the structure of the IDF, unless such orders are patently illegal;
- we consider the destruction of settlements to constitute "transfer", and we consider orders to effect such "transfer" to be patently illegal.
Dr. Ron Breiman, Chairman of PSI
Tel: 050-518 940