Last update - 00:00 20/06/2007
Settler jailed for 2.5 years over attempt to import weapons
By Jack Khoury, Haaretz Correspondent
Haifa District Court sentenced Jeffery Seth, 40, to two and a half years in prison on Wednesday, for attempting to import, produce and hold weapons, as well as illegally owning military supplies.
Seth, a resident of the northern West Bank settlement of Tapuah, immigrated to Israel over a year ago from the United States.
Seth was also sentenced to a suspended sentence of an additional 18 months, which will be in effect for three years.
According to the indictment, a crate sent from the U.S. was discovered at Haifa's port, containing a rifle, an arrow gun, an appliance for preparing rifle bullets, a jerrycan containing two liters of gunpowder, 6,500 empty cartridge shells, 490 bullet caps, 100 bullets, 140 spent cartridges and 1,400 slugs, all in hidden compartments.
In addition to this, a telescopic lens was also found at Seth's home, meant for assembly onto a rifle.
Seth has been in custody since June 2006. Shortly after he was indicted last year, an interviewer asked him if he ever thought of using the rifle on Palestinians. "Well, I can't say that the thought didn't cross my mind, every time you see a suicide attack," he told Israel Radio.
During the trial, the prosecution requested a severer sentence, arguing the defendant intended to target Arabs with the weapons, in accordance with his extreme political views.
The defense asked that the court consider time served while he was detained as his sentence. They based this request on Seth's testimony that he intended to hand the weapons over to the Israel Defense Forces, and not make use of them for criminal or harmful purposes.
Braha Bar-Ziv, the presiding judge, ruled the prosecution did not prove that Seth meant to use the weapons against Arabs, but also rejected the defense's claim that he intended to donate the arms to the IDF.
The judgment quoted a Probation Service report that said Seth had difficult experiences in his childhood which had harmed his emotional development and ability to function normally.
According to the report, Seth was placed in institutional care at the age of 11, where he was involved in violent acts for which he received a two years custodial sentence. After his release he worked in agriculture and at 17 he returned to live with his parents.