PFLP supporters in Nablus during a rally marking the 51st anniversary of Hamas’s founding in the West Bank, Dec. 15, 2018. Photo: Nasser Ishtayeh/Flash90.

i24 News – Three residents of northern Israel were indicted on Thursday for providing intelligence to Hamas in Turkey on a large scale and putting Israel’s cyber infrastructure at risk in a future military campaign.

The Cyber ​​Department of the State Attorney’s Office filed the indictment.

They were charged with serious security offenses, including “crimes of aiding the enemy in war” and “providing information to the enemy with the intention of harming the security of the state.”

The investigation involved the Shin Bet internal security service and Israel Police. Israel’s Cellcom company was the alleged target of a future cyber attack during a conflict.

One of the defendants worked for Cellcom since 2004 as a software engineer, the indictment said. In 2017, out of “ideological identification with Hamas and its goals,” he met officials from the Gaza-based extremist group while visiting Turkey.

He was accused of handing them sensitive information on communications infrastructure in Israel, which he came across as part of his work.

In 2020 and 2021, at Hamas’s request, the employee asked another defendant — an adviser to Cellcom — to hand him information on the infrastructure’s weak points, noting it was for use by Hamas. The two employees also conspired to paralyze Cellcom’s networks in wartime, aware that the networks are used by the Israeli military and police.

The brother of one of the defendants was also indicted, who allegedly met with Hamas officials at least three times.