Israeli minister who spied for Iran sentenced to 11 years

Gonen Segev maintained that he had been trying to act as a double agent in order to return to Israel as a hero.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

The Jerusalem District Court sentenced former Energy and Infrastructure Minister Gonen Segev on Tuesday to serve an 11-year sentence for espionage on behalf of Iran.

The 63-year-old had agreed to a plea bargain in January wherein the most serious charge of treason by aiding an enemy during a time of war was dropped in exchange for his full confession.

At the time, his defense team claimed that although Segev had contact with Iranian officials, he had no intention of aiding them.

However, according to a statement made by state prosecutors Geula Cohen and Rachel Aharoni Zeevi, “Segev confessed that he acted on behalf of the Iranian intelligence forces for five years, maintained regular communications with his handlers using a clandestine channel, and provided them a diverse range of information, including top-secret information.”

Segev, whose activities began in 2012, is said to have passed on to his Iranian handlers information related to the energy sector, security sites in Israel and officials in political and security institutions. He also tried luring Israelis in the defense establishment to meet with agents posing as businessmen or other innocent professions, the prosecution said.

An 11-year sentence may seem light for spying for a country aimed at Israel’s destruction. The prosecutors pointed out that the plea bargain allows the state to avoid a long trial that could reveal intelligence sources and methods.

Although Segev admitted all that he had done, he maintained that his motives were pure.

“I wanted to fool the Iranians and come back to Israel a hero,” he was quoted by Channel 10 as saying during his interrogation last year.

The former cabinet minister had also spent time in an Israeli prison for attempting to smuggle some 30,000 Ecstasy pills into the country by using an expired diplomatic passport in 2004. His Israeli medical license was revoked, but he then worked as a physician in Nigeria, where he moved permanently after his release in 2007, even treating members of Israel’s diplomatic staff there.

The fact that a person who once served in a high government position was indicted for serving Iran, considered Israel’s most serious strategic enemy, shocked the country.

Further details are unknown, as the court issued a gag order on the case.