Military tribunal convenes more collaborators trials

A military court resumed marathon sessions related to occupation-related crimes on Wednesday, hearing some 150 cases, most against former members of “Israel”’s defunct proxy militia.
The court, which heard the cases of 115 collaborators and 35 others who reportedly entered “Israel”, was due to hand down its verdicts and sentences around midnight.
The most prominent defendants were Elias Eid, the chief guard of the Israeli-allied militia’s TV station; Manal Sader, the private secretary of the militia’s second-in-command, Aql Hashem, who was killed in a resistance attack in March; and George Mansour, who controlled Lahdi artillery positions that shelled villages along the edge of the former occupation zone.
The tribunal, which is meeting three times a week, has sentenced 250 people since the first session on June 5. The two harshest penalties handed down were 15 years in prison and a 15-year ban from liberated areas.
Sentences of five to 10 years are reserved for those who performed intelligence work for the militia or the “Israeli” Army.
Those who enlisted in the militia have generally been sentenced to one year in prison and those who entered “enemy territory” to one or two months. The penalties, which are sometimes supplemented by fines, have been doubled when they were handed down in absentia.
Those arrested after “Israel”’s withdrawal last month have been held at the army barracks in Beirut or in the nearby suburbs.

The Daily Star, 22-6-2000.