Knesset Approves New Border-Smuggling Law With Up to 9 Years in Prison

The Knesset plenum today (Monday) approved in its second and third readings the Penal Code bill dealing with smuggling not carried out through a border crossing. This is a government bill into which a private bill by MK Amit Halevi was merged. Eight members of Knesset supported the proposal, with no opponents.

Under the proposed law, "Anyone who unlawfully brings an item into Israel or unlawfully takes an item out of Israel, other than through a border station, faces 9 years in prison."

MK Amit Halevi said: "Under this law, any transfer across the border is a security offense. The change we are making today is essential if we are to go back to living like a sovereign state that treats its sovereignty and its borders seriously. Today we are correcting part of the conception, and we will continue to correct it."

The explanatory notes to the bill state: "In recent years, the State of Israel has been dealing with an unprecedented large-scale phenomenon of smuggling into and out of the country, mainly through the use of drones, in a way that creates a real threat to state security."

"This is so even when it does not involve the smuggling of weapons or drugs, for example, which are covered by separate and more serious criminal offenses. The phenomenon of fence smuggling, of any kind — for example, the smuggling of cigarettes, animals, plants, food, or anything else — has in practice turned the border into something of a breach, which also serves terrorist organizations, and therefore constitutes a threat to state security."