A triple citizen of Israel, the United States and the United Kingdom who was arrested in Lebanon in recent days has been freed and deported to the United States, according to Hebrew media reports.
Ynet reported that Joshua Tartakovsky, a 42-year-old Israeli citizen who was born in the United States, was released after pressure from Washington.
Tartakovsky had been arrested by Lebanese security forces in Dahiya, the Hezbollah terrorist stronghold in southern Beirut, media reported on Wednesday.
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He reportedly traveled to Lebanon on a British passport two weeks ago, and aroused authorities’ suspicions. He was reportedly arrested after an Israeli ID was found in his possession.
A former ultra-Orthodox Jew from Jerusalem, he traveled to Lebanon with a group of journalists, Ynet reported. According to the news outlet, he had entered the enemy country several times in the past.
An Israeli official told JNS on Wednesday night that Jerusalem was aware of the arrest and that the case was being handled by authorities.
“Unfortunately, this is not the first time that Israeli citizens have entered the territory of enemy countries, even though this is prohibited by law and constitutes a clear danger to their security,” the official noted.
A U.S. State Department spokesperson told JNS that Washington was “aware of reports of the arrest of a U.S. citizen in Lebanon,” adding that “whenever a U.S. citizen is detained overseas, we stand ready to provide consular assistance. We are closely monitoring the situation.”
The U.K. Foreign Office told JNS that London had “not been approached for support, but our staff stand ready to support British Nationals 24/7.”
Ynet cited friends who called Tartakovsky an “odd duck,” saying he “always changed opinions. One day he is far-right, the next day far-left.”
“The strangest was his Facebook. For half a year he was anti-Zionist, then for half a year as a [far-right] Kahanist,” one of Tartakovsky’s friends told Ynet on Wednesday, adding: “He’s too crazy to be a spy.”
Another friend said, “This is an unstable person. He is definitely not a Mossad agent. … He is an unstable and very intelligent guy. He is against the West and does not live in Israel, but he travels around the world.”
According to Tartakovsky’s author profile for the Dubai-based Vision magazine, he is an “independent journalist who studied at Brown University and the London School of Economics.” In the past, he appeared on Press TV, an Iranian state-controlled propaganda channel.
Tartakovsky served in the Israel Defense Forces as “an occupying soldier in the Jordan Valley,” according to his profile for Truthout. In a 2014 op-ed for the far-left website, he described Hamas terrorism as “resistance.”
Under Israeli and Lebanese law, it is illegal for citizens of the Jewish state to enter Lebanon.
Jerusalem has escalated attacks in Lebanon since adding the return of evacuated Israeli civilians to the north as an official war goal on Sept. 17.
Hezbollah has attacked the Jewish state on a near-daily basis since Oct. 8, in support of Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The Iranian-backed Hezbollah terrorist army has fired more than 12,400 rockets, missiles and drones at Israel over the past year, killing more than 40 people and causing widespread damage. Tens of thousands of Israelis remain internally displaced due to the ongoing cross-border attacks.
Late last month, a well-known German journalist was detained by a group of armed men in Beirut and held for several hours shortly after the slaying of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, his newspaper said earlier on Wednesday. He was released without further explanation.
Paul Ronzheimer, a war correspondent for the Bild newspaper, was arrested with other members of his team on Sept. 28, a day after Israel dropped dozens of bunker-busting bombs on a Hezbollah headquarters in Beirut, killing Nasrallah and other top commanders, Bild reported.