Appeal to the State Attorney: Demand to prosecute police officers who conducted a strip search of a protester in Tel Aviv

The Association for Civil Rights in Israel filed an appeal to the State Attorney against the decision of the Police Investigation Department (Mahash) to close the investigation file regarding the strip search conducted on protester Itamar Greenberg after he was arrested at a demonstration in Tel Aviv. In the appeal, the Association demands to overturn the decision and to act to file indictments against the police officers and the officials who ordered the search, approved it, and carried it out.

Greenberg, who was 19 at the time of the incident, was arrested on March 3 during a demonstration at Habima Square against the war in Iran. According to the Association, even before he was put into the patrol car, a search of his clothes and belongings was conducted and nothing was found. After he was brought to the police station, the officer who arrested him ordered a search "with full stripping."

According to the appeal, Greenberg was required to stand for several minutes in his underwear, and subsequently to lower them to his knees, turn around, and squat. When he protested and claimed that the search was illegal, he was told, according to his claim, that if he refused, an officer would remove his underwear by force. It is further claimed that the search was conducted in a room with internal windows that allowed him to be watched, and that he was not given a search report.

Mahash closed the case last June on the grounds that no infrastructure was found indicating a reasonable suspicion of committing a criminal offense. The Association argues, on the other hand, that the law does not allow for a full strip search as a matter of routine, but only when there is a reasonable basis to suspect that a person's body contains evidence related to the offense for which they are suspected.

According to the Association, in Greenberg's case, no such suspicion existed, among other reasons because he was arrested during a demonstration, had already undergone a search that yielded no findings, and there was no indication that he was hiding evidence on his body. It is further claimed that the officer who performed the search did not point to a specific suspicion, but said that it is customary at the station to conduct a full strip search on every detainee before placing them in a cell. The Association argues that if this is indeed a regular practice or a sweeping directive, it is conduct that contradicts the law. According to them, the case joins a series of cases in which protesters and detainees were required to strip, and sometimes also to turn around and squat, in cases where they claim there was no legal justification.

"A strip search without legal cause may create a suspicion of various criminal offenses. Beyond the violation of dignity and privacy, the use of such searches against protesters may create a 'chilling effect' and deter citizens from participating in protests," stated Advocate Elsa Bonia and Advocate Nitzan Ilani from the Association for Civil Rights in Israel.

The two also argued that prosecuting police officers in cases where an illegal search was conducted is a public interest, and that the police must clarify to its officers that the exercise of search authority must be done in accordance with the provisions of the law and subject to the existence of an appropriate cause.