Israeli PM's guards order pregnant Arab woman to strip

Israeli PM's guards order pregnant Arab woman to strip
JERUSALEM - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's guards ordered a pregnant Arab newswoman to remove her bra and told other reporters to strip to their underwear, journalists said on Wednesday.

The demands were made on Tuesday as journalists tried to enter a five-star hotel in Jerusalem for the premier's annual reception for the foreign press, prompting some to walk out rather than face humiliating and invasive searches.

The incident drew cries of outrage from the Tel Aviv-based Foreign Press Association (FPA).

"While we appreciate the need for security, it is not remotely acceptable to invite people for cocktails at a five-star hotel and then make them undress at the door," it said.

Najwan Simri, an Arab-Israeli reporter and producer who works for Al-Jazeera television, said that a female security agent asked her to take off her coat and shirt, and finally her bra.

"I am in the fourth month of pregnancy and I asked them not to use the metal detector on me but they took no notice," she told AFP. When they told her to remove her bra, she said she refused and was barred from entering.

The FPA said several of its members were forced to remove their underwear, including the Wall Street Journal's Jerusalem bureau chief.

A spokesman for the Shin Bet, which is responsible for Netanyahu's security, confirmed an incident involving an Al-Jazeera reporter, saying that by not complying with instructions she had in effect decided to leave the function.

"All the guests were checked according to standing procedures, as was this lady," he told AFP.

"She refused to complete the procedure as requested and so she chose not to enter the event."

AFP photographer Menahem Kahana, an Israeli who has covered official events for 25 years and is a regular visitor to government offices, says he was chatting to an Arab colleague in the queue for inspection when they were both plucked from the line.

"I heard a woman from the security detail say, 'they're together'," he said. "We waited and waited, 15, minutes, 20 minutes. Everybody else went past and we waited."

Then he said he was taken to a separate area where he was very thoroughly frisked by hand then examined with an electronic wand.

"It beeped when he passed it over my trouser zipper and he told me I had to take my trousers down," Kahana said. "I said enough is enough. I'm not dropping my trousers. I don't care. I won't photograph the reception. I'll go home."

Kahana said the agent at first refused to let him leave the cubicle and threatened to call police if he refused the order.

Only when a second security officer was called, apparently a superior, was the issue resolved and he was allowed to proceed, albeit after a further long delay while his camera equipment was taken apart and examined, he said.

"We ask for assurances that this will not happen again or we will respectfully decline further invitations," the FPA statement said.

Prime ministerial security was drastically tightened in the wake of the 1995 assassination of premier Yitzhak Rabin by a Jewish ultrarightist opposed to his concessions to the Palestinians in interim peace accords.

Today, even known reporters who attend events such as the weekly cabinet meeting on a regular basis are closely checked and the contents of their bags and pockets screened.

They are also often asked to remove belts, shoes and watches.