- Title: JERUSALEM/ISRAEL: Arab man convicted of rape after pretending to be Jewish
- Date: 23rd July 2010
- Summary: VARIOUS OF KASHUR SITTING WITH HIS CHILDREN
- Embargoed: 7th August 2010 13:00
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- Reuters ID: LVAZS5RP4NM04TE5K9GQX9LM1BR
- Story Text: An Arab man who had consensual sex with a Jewish woman in Israel has been convicted of "rape by deception" and sentenced to 18 months in jail for lying about being single and Jewish.
30-year-old Sabbar Kashur was found guilty and sentenced on Monday (July 19), after a trial in which the woman said she would not have had sex with him if he hadn't pretended he was a Jewish bachelor.
Kashur has been living under house arrest for nearly two years, waiting for his trial. He said the woman only pressed charges after she found out he was Arab.
"We sat for about 15 minutes and then after 15 minutes the girl told me openly, I want an act, I want you. So what happened is we went into a building in the area and she carried out a complete relationship with me with consent and no problem, and then I left. I was surprised after a month and a half when I got a phone call from the police and they told me to come," he said.
He admitted that he used his Jewish nickname 'Dudu' with the woman, and that he had pretended to be single.
"I sat for almost two and a half years imprisoned (under house arrest) and now they give me another 18 months for what, for pretending to be something I am not? I said my name is Dudu and I am a bachelor not married, lets say for example I said I was a pilot and the girl loved pilots and then found out that I was not a pilot, would they sentence someone to 18 months because he said he was a pilot and it turned out he was not?" he said.
The court said that while the woman agreed to the sexual liaison, Kashur misrepresented himself, and it had a duty to protect the public against "sophisticated, smooth-talking criminals who can lead innocent victims astray".
Doctor Noga Pugach, from the Centre for Victims of Crime at Ono Academic College, said the case was not based on race and had clear legal precedence.
In 2008, an Israeli man was convicted of rape by the country's Supreme Court for posing as a government official and persuaded women to have sex with him by promising them state benefits.
"The Supreme Court of Israel set this case as a precedent saying that if the lie goes to a material fact, the consent would be negated, the woman did not consent to the actual act, to the actual identity of the man, of the person, so it became criminal. I have to say that this last precedent was of a Jewish man, so we can't say that this new case was based on the ethnic origin of the perpetrator," said Pugach.
But Professor Zeev Segal, legal commentator for ISrael's liberal Haaretz newspaper, said both cases were unconstitutional and undermined real rape trials.
"I hope that now the Supreme Court will re-examine this question, how to interpret the law so that it would not cover such a situation, when a man and woman, Jewish or Arab or whatever decided to have sexual intercourse, you can not call it a rape, it is a degrading of the concept of such a harsh or such as severe offence like rape," he said.
For now, Kashur is facing 18 months in prison.
"I say to my wife until this day to forgive me. The only people I have done wrong in this whole story are my wife and kids because they have paid a high price with me." he added.
Intermarriage is rare in Israel between Jews and Arabs, who make up 20 percent of the population. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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