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Palestinian sentenced for "rape by deception" of Israeli to appeal

Arab World Materials 21 July 2010 17:17 (UTC +04:00)
An East Jerusalem Palestinian sentenced to 18 months in prison for "rape by deception" after pretending to be a Jew in order to have consensual sex with an Israeli woman, will appeal his sentence, his lawyer said Wednesday.
Palestinian sentenced for "rape by deception" of Israeli to appeal

An East Jerusalem Palestinian sentenced to 18 months in prison for "rape by deception" after pretending to be a Jew in order to have consensual sex with an Israeli woman, will appeal his sentence, his lawyer said Wednesday, DPA reported.

The sentence handed out to Sabbar Kashur was too harsh and not proportional, Adnan Aladin said.

Kashur, who was also ordered to pay 2,500 dollars compensation in Monday's sentencing, had consensual sex with the Israeli woman.

She then lodged a complaint with police after she found out that he was not a Jew, as she said she had been led to believe.

He had originally been charged with rape, but the prosecution accepted a charge of "rape by deception" after a defence investigation into the facts of the case.

Kashur had not contested the indictment, but said the sex was consensual.

However, Jerusalem District Court Judge Zvi Segal wrote in his verdict that if the woman had not "thought the accused was a Jewish bachelor interested in a serious romantic relationship, she would not have cooperated."

Rape by deception is a crime in Israel. In 2008 an Israeli Jew, Zvi Sleiman, was sentenced to 10 years in jail for pretending to be a senior official from the Ministry of Housing, in order to lure women into bed.

The Supreme Court overturned his appeal, with Judge Eliakim Rubinstein ruling that a conviction for rape should be imposed any time a "person does not tell the truth regarding critical matters to a reasonable woman, and as a result of misrepresentation she has sexual relations with him."

According to Elkana Laist of the Public Defender's Office, the court went too far in sentencing Kashur , and was "opening the door to a rape conviction every time a person lies regarding details of his identity."

"Every time the court thinks a reasonable woman would not have had sex with a man based on that representation, the man will be charged with rape," the Israeli Ha'aretz daily quoted her as saying.

However, Dana Paguch, of the Noga Centre for Victims of Crime, noted that "we all have different characteristics, and it is a person's right to have sexual relations with a person knowing the facts about those characteristics."

"I see no difference between impersonating a Jew if you are an Arab and a wealthy pilot when you are penniless, if those are relevant characteristics to the decision to have sex," she said.

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