BRITISHER JAILED FOR AIDING ARABS

Grey River Argus, 11 October 1948, Page 7

BRITISHER JAILED FOR AIDING ARABS

LONDON, Oct. 9. At Jerusalem a District Court sentenced Frederick William Sylvestei, aged 32, a British employee, of the Jerusalem Electric Corporation, to seven years’ imprisonment for broadcasting information useful to an enemy of Israel and to six months’ imprisonment on each .ot two other charges, namely operating an unlicensed wireless transmitter and transmitting without a license. Sylvester was one of the five Britons seized at the gunpoint by Irgun Zvai Leumi terrorists on July 8. He was handed over to Israel authorities ten days later. He stood his trial on an espionage charge with William George Hawkins, aged 36, who was freed on September 29. The president of the court said Sylvester had been found guilty of spying and was liable to fourteen years’ imprisonment, but the court thought that he was not one of the main organisers “of this espionage network.” He said Jewish security authorities had been guilty of gross negligence because they knew of the transmitter and Sylvester’s broadcasts but did nothing to stop them. This did not diminish the seriousness of the crime. It was later made clear that Sylvester’s seven years’ sentence was imposed for broadcasting • information to the Arab-occupied Old City on the results of the shelling of the Jewish area.