ISN SECURITY WATCH (27/07/05) - Israeli Attorney-General Menachem Mazuz is considering filing criminal charges against a group of extremist settlers for invoking a mystical curse on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in an effort to halt the Gaza disengagement.
In a ritual held in the northern town of Rosh Pina, 20 rabbis and activists from hard-right movements
invoked the kabbalistic pulsa denura (“lashes of fire”) curse, calling on supernatural forces to kill the prime minister. The ritual was held at the gravesite of a right-wing militant hung by the British in 1938 for shooting at an Arab bus.
One of the participants, prominent right-wing activist Michael Ben-Horin, told the Israeli Ha’aretz daily newspaper that the ritual “called on the angels of destruction to kill Ariel Sharon”. He expressed his frustration that the tight security surrounding the prime minister prevented his assassination.>>>>snip
Rabbi Yosef Dagan, who was involved in the invocation of the “lashes of fire” against Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995 weeks before his assassination, also participated in the ceremony, which is meant to lead to the death of the person cursed within 30 days. If those performing the ritual are impure the curse is thought to kill those who took part.Sharon’s son indicted for corruptionIn the meantime, Sharon’s political machine faces another potentially devastating blow with corruption charges against the prime minister’s son, Omri Sharon.
Attorney-General Mazuz announced on Tuesday night that he would be bringing an indictment against Omri Sharon on charges of forgery, perjury, and the violation of campaign funding laws during the organization of his father’s campaigns for the Likud party leadership and the office of the prime minister.
Between late 1999 and early 2000, Omri Sharon is alleged to have raised over 6.5 million shekels (US$1.43 million) for his father’s campaigns, more than seven times the sum allowed by Israel's strict Political Parties Law. Most of the money is thought to have come from wealthy benefactors in the US.
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