Convicted spy Azzam Azzam sues employers for millions

Azzam Azzam, an Israeli Druze textile worker from the town of Maghar who spent eight years in an Egyptian prison for allegedly spying for Israel, is suing his former employer Tefron for a total sum of NIS 7.5 million

In his suit, Azzam argues that the company ignored its responsibilities toward him and abandoned him "wounded on the battlefield."

he is also suing Arie Wolfson and Sigi Rabinowicz, who owned controlling shares in Tefron at the time, and were senior executives in the textiles company, and Micha Korman, who also held executive office at Tefron.

Azzam has filed two suits against Tefron, one at the Tel Aviv District Court and the other at the Tel Aviv Labor Tribunal.

Among other things, he is demanding that the company compensate him for his legal costs in Egypt, loss of income, his family's costs on visiting him in the Egyptian prison, medical costs, compensation for pain, suffering, and anguish.

The minimum sum for a claim in the District Court is NIS 2.5 million. At the Labor Tribunal, Azzam is claiming more than NIS 5 million in owed wages, severance compensation, redemption of vacation, social benefits, and more.

In his claim, Azzam says that Tefron hired him in 1989 and sent him to Egypt to help set up a plant there. In one of his business trips, in November 1996, he was arrested by the Egyptian security forces and tried on charges of spying for Israel.

He was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. Israel obtained his release after eight years.

Azzam also claimed that Tefron ignored the risks of sending him to Egypt, and did not make sufficient effort to secure his release. After he was released, the company refused to pay him for that period, and even refused to compensate him for the damages he suffered as its delegate to Egypt.

While Azzam was in Egypt, he goes on to claim, a feud erupted between Tefron and its Egyptian partners, who were highly influential in Cairo circles and connected to the president, Hosni Mubarak. He claims that the Egyptian partners threatened the defendants, but that he was not told of these threats. Azzam also claims that these threats were material to his arrest.

During his incarceration, Azzam claims to have undergone severe abuse and to have lived in dreadful conditions. Since his return to Israel, he has had serious difficulty adjusting, as happens among prisoners of war, for instance, who need a great deal of help returning to life. Although he received severance pay of NIS 39,300 upon his return, the company refused to give him his rights as a worker throughout his period of imprisonment in Egypt.

Tefron also threatened that if he persisted with his demands, it would reconsider continuing to employ his brother, Azzam claims.

He also charges that once Tefron decided to send him to a foreign, unfriendly country, namely Egypt, it bore heightened responsibility for his welfare and safety.

At the Labor Tribunal, Azzam is demanding that the company pay him wages and social beenfits for the entire period period he was imprisoned in Egypt, during which time Tefron remained his sole employer.