Courtesy of JNS. Photo credit: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90
Haredi Jews in the Tel Aviv suburb of Bnei Brak, Feb. 27, 2024
(JNS) — Prosecutors on Thursday filed an indictment against a resident of Bnei Brak in central Israel on charges of spying for Iran.
Asher Binyamin Weiss is accused of tracking an Israeli nuclear scientist at the direction of Iranian agents, for the purpose of assassination.
Weiss faces charges of contact with a foreign agent, providing intelligence to the enemy and obstruction of justice.
He allegedly used a GoPro camera to record the scientist’s home and vehicle, sending the footage to an Iranian agent. The agent then transferred the footage to a young man from the Arab neighborhood of Beit Safafa in southern Jerusalem, who was tasked with carrying out the assassination.
According to the indictment, Weiss, also under Iranian direction, allegedly set vehicles on fire, threw pipes onto Israeli roads, sprayed graffiti and posted hundreds of posters in Tel Aviv and Ramat Gan with messages of incitement calling for civil unrest.
Weiss allegedly received thousands of dollars in cryptocurrency for his efforts on behalf of the Islamic Republic.
The prosecutors’ office requested an extension of his detention until the end of the legal proceedings against him “because this case joins a series of serious indictments that have been filed in recent weeks, as part of an uncompromising fight waged by the state attorney’s office against those who seek to harm the security of the state.”
It is the second serious espionage case revealed on Thursday.
Israeli authorities have arrested a married couple from central Israel on suspicion of carrying out espionage for the Islamic Republic.
Rafael and Lala Guliyev, both 32 years of age, from Lod, were taken into custody after an investigation by the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and Israel Police revealed they had been in direct contact with an Iranian intelligence operative.
The duo allegedly tracked sensitive security installations and conducted surveillance on a prominent defense researcher.
Prosecutors were expected to file charges on Thursday.
