RAMALLAH: The identity of Israel's “prisoner X" has been revealed, reports the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Information uncovered by Australian Broadcasting Corporation strongly suggetst that his name was Ben Zygier, an Australian national. Zygier went by Ben Alon in Israel and was married to an Israeli woman with two children. He moved to Israel sometime in the year 2000. In 2010 he was found dead in his cell. He hanged himself. Zygier was suspected of ties to the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence organization responsible for covert operations. This connection explains why he was reportedly held in an ultra-secure wing of the Ayalon prison in Ramla originally built for the assassin of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. The prisoner was of such high priority that even those guarding him did not know his name. Since his death in 2010, he has been the subject of great speculation. There was a gag order on the press releasing information concerning his identity and incarceration. After his body was discovered, the office of the Prime Minister called a special meeting of Israeli media chiefs to request their cooperation. Israeli Knesset members have begun to ask questions regarding “prisoner X", leading to a relaxation of the gag order. Human Rights violation Ben Zygier is said to have vanished shortly before information about “prisoner X" surfaced. When the sparse details surrounding the imprisonment of “prisoner X" surfaced, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel wrote a letter to the Israeli Attorney-General saying “It's alarming that there's a prisoner being held incommunicado and we know nothing about him." Bill van Esveld, a Jerusalem-based advocate for Human Rights Watch, told Foreign Correspondent that the prisoner's apprehension was “a disappearance, and a disappearance is not only a violation of that person's due process rights – that's a crime". The suicide only serves to heighten the mystery surrounding the case. The cell was equipped with state-of-the-art surveillance equipment designed to inhibit events such as this. The family of Zygier has declined to comment. BN
