Last update - 00:00 27/02/2008
Shas MK Benizri's aide opens envelope filled with white powder
By Shahar Ilan, Haaretz Correspondent
Shas MK Shlomo Benizri's aide received medical treatment on Wednesday evening after he opened an envelope sent from overseas which contained a white powder.
"The substance spilt on my hands, face and body and I felt dizzy and saw stars," said Yithak Avidani. All other Knesset employees working on the fisrt floor of the building were evacuated in light of the incident, but were promptly allowed to return to their offices.
Avidani was taken immediately to the Knesset's medical clinic and later transferred for testing at Jerusalem's Hadassah Ein-Kerem hospital.
The incident resembled an anti-Semitic attack on Avram Grant, the Israeli coach of Britain's Chelsea football club last week. Grant and his wife received anti-Semitic death threats in the mail accompanied by a white powder which the accompanying message claimed was lethal.
MK Benizri said he did not want to hurl false accusations, but could not dismiss the possibility that the attack was a response to his comments last week blaming the homosexual community for recent earthquake activity in Israel.
The white powder was taken to a biological research center for testing.
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