Shabak Agents Assault Olmert Protesters in Moscow Synagogue

(Protester with sign reading 'Olmert Where Are The Captured Soldiers')

An incident that is generally going unreported in the media or on the rare occasions that is being reported is being dismissed as a 'disturbance created by hooligans' (a Soviet era euphemism) was the assault by Shabak agents on Beitar activists protesting Olmert's Russian visit at the Moscow Great Synagogue.

In a scene more reminiscent of KGB crackdowns on protesting Jews, on the 18th of October at 9 o'clock, as Olmert was speaking 15 members of the Moscow branch of the Beitar movement stood up on the balcony of the Ezrat Nashim with signs reading 'Olmert Betrayed the Captured Soldiers and the Residents of Sderot', 'Olmert Where Are The Captured Soldiers' and 'You Lost, Now Resign.'

As soon as they unrolled the signs, they were attacked by Shabak agents who tore away their signs and tore them up, assaulting both male and female protesters, tearing up the signs, twisting their arms behind their backs and pushing them out of the hall into a smaller hall. (The agents themselves were all of russian-speaking descent.)

Though this was Russian territory, the agents took away their passports, demanded information about their places of residents and where they went to university and to write explanatory notes to the FSB (the current incarnation of the KGB) for their actions. The FSB and special forces were called in and the agents threatened and mocked them saying, 'There'll be another Amona now."

Only calls to Olmert's press secretary threatening a press conference finally obtained the release of the activists 20 minutes later, but they were warned that their universities would be informed of their actions.

The entire story shows the disturbing extent to which Shabak works hand in glove with the FSB and an abuse of authority on foreign soil that has also occurred in Europe and America.