Freed journalist: 'Israel should be ashamed'

British journalist Peter Hounam was released from Israeli custody tonight after a day in custody on suspicions linked to freed nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu.

As he left the Jerusalem jail where he had been quizzed by secret service agents, Hounam said Israel should be ashamed for arresting him.

He complained of being confined in a “dungeon with excrement on the walls” and limited to “two hours of sleep.”

His lawyer said he was questioned for eight hours by Israeli security.

Hounam wrote the Sunday Times article in 1986 based on Vanunu’s information and pictures from Israel’s top-secret nuclear reactor, leading experts to conclude that Israel had a large nuclear weapons arsenal.

He was preparing a documentary for the BBC. About the Vanunu case when he was arrested on Wednesday night.

The British ambassador, Simon McDonald, had raised Hounam’s arrest in a meeting with Justice Minister Yosef Lapid today.

“We’re very concerned by his arrest,” said an embassy spokeswoman. “This is a serious issue.”

Hounam has been in Israel since Vanunu’s release from prison last month after an 18-year sentence for espionage and treason.

Hounam’s lawyer, Avigdor Feldman said he had no idea why he had been arrested, although he confirmed reports that Hounam was in possession of a video cassette. He gave no details on the tape’s contents.

Under conditions imposed with his release, Vanunu is not allowed to give interviews or meet with foreigners. Feldman, who also represents Vanunu, said Hounam has not violated any of the restrictions and called the arrest a farce.

Colleagues said Hounam was arrested by Shin Bet agents last night in the Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Gan as he headed to a dinner meeting with Yael Lotan, an anti-nuclear activist who had lobbied for Vanunu’s release from prison.

“He was about to reach my house. He rang from the car and said he had taken the wrong turn. I was all set to go downstairs. Instead he disappeared,” Lotan said.

Within an hour, she said she received a message that he was in his hotel in Jerusalem, accompanied by Shin Bet agents.

Donatella Rovera, a researcher with the human rights group Amnesty International who was staying at the same hotel, said she was sitting in the hotel’s garden when Hounam arrived with five plainclothes officers.

“He said ’I’m being arrested, tell the Sunday Times,” she said, adding that he was immediately pulled away.

She said the officers searched Hounam’s room for about 20 minutes, then took the reporter, along with several bags, into a vehicle outside.

A BBC spokeswoman in London said the broadcaster was ”very concerned” about the arrest.

The Foreign Press Association, which represents international news organisations in Israel, expressed ”astonishment” over the arrest, saying Hounam’s basic rights had been denied, and called on authorities to publicise any charges against Hounam.

Israeli security officials said Shin Bet agents have been shadowing Vanunu since his April 21 release, assigning a special unit to surveillance. Vanunu, a convert to Christianity, has been living at an Anglican church in Jerusalem.

Dan Seaman, director of the Israeli Government Press Office, said that if Hounam was arrested, it was for serious offences.

He noted that his office had issued Hounam press credentials two weeks ago without any problems. “This is irregular and so I assume they did not arrest him as a journalist but because they have real reasons,” Seaman said.

Israel pursues a policy of ambiguity about nuclear weapons, saying only that it will not be the first to introduce them.