Israeli Peacenik Sentenced for Meeting With Arafat

A judge sentenced Israeli peace activist Abie Nathan today to six months in prison for violating an Israeli law by meeting with PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat.

Nathan, who pleaded guilty to the charge last week, said he would fight to overturn the law “even from my prison cell.” He received a one-year suspended sentence in addition to the jail term.

The 63-year-old Nathan operates the pirate radio station “Voice of Peace” from a ship in the Mediterranean.

Nathan stood silent as Aharon Fass, deputy president of the Ramle Magistrate’s Court, read the sentence.

The activist told reporters later that his jailing would not halt his efforts for Arab-Israeli peace.

“If somebody thinks I’m going to stop . . . they’re in for big surprises,” he said. “I hope that public opinion and the people in the streets will understand that this law is an obstacle to peace.

“I will continue even from my prison cell to protest against this law . . . and immediately after prison I shall continue to speak to the enemy,” he said.

Nathan pleaded guilty Wednesday to meeting with Arafat and other PLO activists in Tunisia and France in September, 1988. He told the court he knew he was violating a 1986 amendment to the anti-terror law that prohibits holding meetings with terrorist organizations.

Reacting to the sentence, leaders of two left-wing political parties, Shinui and the Citizen’s Rights Movement, called for the repeal of the law prohibiting meetings with the PLO, which Israel refuses to recognize and labels as a terrorist organization.

The Citizen’s Rights Movement said it will propose a law at the next session of the Knesset to allow meetings with the PLO for the purpose of promoting peace.