Gag order partially lifted on journalist espionage case

Walla! journalist Anat Kam allegedly copied 2,000 secret IDF documents and passed them on to a reporter.

Journalist Anat Kam is being charged with serious espionage, delivery of classified documents with the intention of damaging Israel's security, and collecting and holding classified documents with the intention of damaging Israel's security. The Tel Aviv District Court today partially lifted the gag order on the case in response to requests by the media, including "Globes", to ease the sweeping gag order on the case that was filed with the court on January 14.

At the request of "Globes" attorney Adv. Yoram Muszkat, the court lifted the gag order relating to "Haaretz" journalist Uri Blau, who is currently abroad, and is wanted for questioning by Israel's security services.

Kam has been working in recent years as a journalist for the portal Walla! She served in the IDF in 2005-07 at the office of the IDF Central Commander Maj.-Gen. Yair Naveh. The indictment states that, during her military service, she removed from the IDF more than 2,000 documents for ideological reasons, and offered them to a journalist from "Yediot Ahronot", who did not accept them. She then delivered the documents to Blau.

The documents include IDF plans for dealing with various scenarios, detailed operating plans, descriptions of unit deployments during routine missions and in emergencies, and situation assessments.

Professional sources believe that the removal of the documents from the IDF and the handling them to unauthorized parties with no supervisory or control mechanism was liable to result in top secret documents, whose disclosure could jeopardize lives, reaching enemies, and causing cause serious and prolonged damage to Israel's security and its ability to deal with looming threats.

A lawyer representing Kam, Adv. Nissim Duek, said in response, "There was no intent to damage Israel's security. This is a dangerous precedent in which the handing of information to an Israeli newspaper is considered as contact with a foreign agent."

Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 8, 2010

© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2010

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