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Israeli Arab charged for joining jihadist groups in Syria

Xinhua, January 29, 2015 Adjust font size:

Israel Security Agency (the Shin Bet) on Thursday announced that earlier this month it arrested an Israeli Arab on suspicion of joining al-Qaida-affiliated groups in Syria.

"Amin Ahmed Salah Snobar, 24, from the village of Yasif (in northern Israel), was arrested on Jan. 2, after returning from Syria, where he had stayed since July 2014," the Shin Bet said in a statement.

Snobar, an Arab citizen of Israel, admitted in his interrogation that he had traveled to Syria, where he was trained with al-Nusra Front and Ansar al-Sham, radical Islamic branches of al-Qaida.

On Thursday, he was indicted in an Israeli court for "joining an illegal organization, taking part in forbidden military exercises, providing services for an illegal organization and obstruction of justice," according to his charge sheet.

Israeli security forces have previously arrested Israeli citizens for travelling to Syria to join jihadist groups.

On Jan. 4, the Shin Bet said it uncovered a three-member Islamic State-inspired cell in the Palestinian West Bank and two weeks later it announced to arrest seven Arab Israeli citizens from Israel's northern Galilee region for setting up an additional Islamic State cell inside Israel.

Last year, Israel said it has information on 30 citizens who travelled to Syria to join jihadist groups. Endit