Israel's Knesset to look at arrest and death of Australian Ben Zygier

ISRAELI legislators will hold an independent  inquiry into the arrest and death of "Prisoner X" Australian Ben Zygier.

ATTORNEY-General Mark Dreyfus doesn't see a need for a review in his department of what Australia's spy agencies might have known about the case of Ben Zygier, the Australian who died in an Israeli jail.

Foreign Minister Bob Carr has ordered a review of his department's handling of the mysterious case of the Melbourne man after it emerged Australian diplomats knew about his imprisonment in Israel before his death.

Mr Carr is also asking Israel for some explanations concerning Mr Zygier's arrest by Israeli authorities in February 2010, when he was held in a maximum security cell under a false name until he died, apparently by his own hand, in December 2010.

Mr Dreyfus was asked if his department would review what Australia's intelligence organisations might have known about the case.

"As I say I don't comment on intelligence matters, but I haven't seen any need either for any such review to take place within the attorney-general's department," he said.

"As the foreign minister said, he's called for a review of the way in which the Department of Foreign Affairs dealt with - what I do need to say is - a family tragedy for the family concerned and that review will be forthcoming soon."

Israel’s powerful Knesset, the legislative branch of the government that passes all laws and supervises the work of the government, announced an “intensive examination” would be conducted into the jailing and death of Mr Zygier.

The Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defence Subcommittee for Intelligence vowed to look at all aspects of the case of the 34-year-old, dubbed "Prisoner X" as no-one was to know his name after he was jailed in the Ayalon prison in 2010 and later died in his cell.

Chairman of that committee Tzachi Hanegbi confirmed the issue would be looked at.

The move came as Israel’s Jewish Home Member of the Knesset Uri Ariel wrote to the law making committee calling for the forming of an inquiry committee to look at the issue. Mr Ariel has offered to chair the panel in order to raise the issue as a priority and vote to form a full government commission of inquiry to look at "the difficult findings in this case".

"There was a slip-up here, we don’t understand what happened here therefore the Knesset needs to have its say and form an inquiry commission," he said.

The move came after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke for the first time about the affair, rejecting criticism of the Mossad security service and defending gag orders that had been placed on the issue locally.

"Israel’s security and intelligence forces act under the full supervision of the legal authorities which are completely independent," he said, adding freedom of expression was always protected.

"But we are also more threatened and face more challenges and thus we must maintain the proper activities of or security services," he said.

Mr Netanyahu said Mossad had to be allowed to work "undisturbed" so the country could live in "security and tranquility".

As reported earlier, Zygier was recruited by Mossad sometime in 2001 but was allegedly speaking with ASIO about Mossad’s practice of using Australian passports for espionage operations when he was arrested.

Meanwhile a number of Israeli Opposition MPs have called on the government to respond to the controversy.

Lawmaker Nachman Shai said there were oversights with many aspects of the Zygier case in intelligence, legal, public, media and parliament and warned with Australia’s Foreign Minister Bob Carr publicly pledging an inquiry into the affair and making it public, Israel risked seen as an “empty vessel” and irrelevant internationally and also to the Israeli public.

"Time is a crucial factor and I demand that the State Comptroller allocate the time for the investigation and commit to publish his findings for the public to see as soon as possible," he said.

Another Knesset Member Eitan Cabel said the defence establishment had questions to answer over making "people vanish".

"The current episode should lead to a shake up in all the branches of the security establishment," he said.

Australia's foreign minister, Bob Carr, demanded that Israel provide information on the prisoner for an Australian investigation into his death.

"We have asked the Israeli government for a contribution to that report," Carr told reporters. "We want to give them an opportunity to submit to us an explanation of how this tragic death came about."

Meanwhile, ASIO has been blamed as having a part hand in the death of Zygier after allegedly leaking information of his work as a Mossad agent to the press.

Zygier, who a court in Israel has concluded killed himself in his high security cell at Ramle Ayalon Prison in 2010, did not commit treason according to a Israeli security analyst familiar with the case Ron Ben-Yishai.

He said instead information that he may have been giving to ASIO about the use of Australian passports by Mossad to carry out espionage work was allegedly leaked by ASIO to the media and it was the basis of what had appeared in the press that Israeli authorities arrested the Australian man.

“He did not carry out an act of betrayal and he did not commit an iniquitous crime, he simply did not measure up to the expectations of his family and his environment and most of all himself,” Mr Ben Yishai said today.

He accused ASIO of having a “substantive” hand in the death of Zygier by putting media on his trail and “burning” him as a source.

ASIO would not comment on Mr Ben-Yishai's claims today.

Mr Ben-Yishai confirmed Zygier and two other Australians had been questioned by ASIO before Zygier’s arrest by Israeli authorities.

He also revealed Zygier had returned to Israel after a trip to Melbourne and had apparently reported his contact, and that of his two Australian-Israeli nationals colleagues, with ASIO to his Mossad commanders.

Israel today sought to defend its jailing of Australian "prisoner X" Ben Zygier by declaring it a case of pikuach nefesh - the Jewish imperative to save lives at all cost.

Vice Premier and Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon said  Israel’s "unique" security situation sometimes called for "extreme measures" and that the secret jailing of alleged Mossad agent Zygier was critical.

Former prime minister Kevin Rudd said yesterday he was limited in what he could say on the case due to national security issues, but he was surprised when he saw this story "bob up" in the media last week.

"Deeply surprised to hear not only had this person been incarcerated, but subsequently died in custody," he told Sky News.

"I think we need to get to the bottom of this."

Mr Rudd said the Australian government was "not impressed" in 2010 when it emerged Israel had used Australian passports in an operation to assassinate a Hamas operative in Dubai.

The government took action then, and needed to work out what happened in the Prisoner X case before determining if further actions were necessary now, Mr Rudd said.

"The tradition of this government has to be robust on these matters, even with a country with whom we've had the friendliest of relationships going back to the foundation of Israel in 1947," he said.

Zygier, a dual Australian-Israeli citizen, was jailed in 2010 after he was allegedly attempting to leak sensitive information about Mossad espionage operations including allegedly deploying assassins to the Middle East using Australian passports.

"We have to assume that if we reached such a state, it means there was a slip here that required that steps be taken by the organisation under discussion … under full supervision and after many considerations," Mr Ya’alon said, declining to confirm Zygier was a Mossad agent or what it was he was doing that saw him jailed in the first place.

Zygier apparently took his own life in December 2010, four days after the birth of his second daughter and a day after he was visited by his lawyer. The Melbourne-born man had been offered a plea bargain for his alleged crimes but wanted to clear his name; three trial judges heard the undisclosed case against him in secret.

Mr Ya’alon slammed local Israeli MPs who have demanded answers from the secretive state about the jailing and death for painting Israel as "benighted undemocratic state" and its defence units as unprofessional. He said the move was for political gain but the defence establishment - including presumably Mossad - "had learned a lesson" from the controversy.

Meanwhile, it is being speculated cameras in the Zygier’s cell supposedly to give him 24/7 security may have been turned off on the orders of Mossad to block him as "prisoner X" from revealing his true identity.

Israel media have revealed the prison service was given strict orders to not engage the prisoner or allow any contact with the outside world and were even barred from allowing standard access to pre-detention psychologist and prison official interviews.

It is suspected Zygier may have wanted to use the cameras in his high security Ayalon prison cell to reveal to the outside world who and where he was; in 1986 Israeli nuclear physicist and whistle blower Mordechai Vanunu arrested, detained and put to trial in secret famously wrote on his hand details about his identity and "kidnapping" by the Mossad and flashed it to cameras from a prison van window in the hope of getting a message to the outside world.

Israel media has hinted that Mossad may have wanted to prevent Zygier revealing any details of his detention like Vanunu, who had also been arrested after attempting to leak sensitive information to the media.

Zygier was placed in a high security cell designed for top high level prisoners and to specifically stop self harm. Local media has aggressively questioned Mossad, the Israel intelligence service, and provide full details of why Zygier was detained amid confirmation he was a Mossad agent and may have wanted to reveal details of his organisations working to either the media or ASIO.

There is also wide local condemnation for how it was the judiciary allowed Zygier, to be tried by three judges secretly. A verdict had not been delivered before he was found dead, just four days after the birth of his second daughter and days after he was visited by his lawyer who described him as concerned about his predicament but showing no signs of depression or mental distress.

It has been speculated Zygier was about to reveal to ASIO how Mossad uses the identities of foreigners including Australians and their passports for offshore espionage or assassination missions including that of the slaying in Dubai of Hamas strongman Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in 2010.

Dubai Police Chief Lt. Gen. Dahi Khalfan denied reports Zygier was cooperating with his forces over the murder but would not deny he was wanted for questioning over the murder.