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Sheriff returns from Israel

Written by PETER KUEBECK Sentinel Staff Writer

Wednesday, 23 May 2012 10:19

File photo. Sheriff Mark Wasylyshyn.

United States and Israel may be an ocean and two continents apart, but they share concerns about security - both foreign and domestic.
Wood County Sheriff Mark Wasylyshyn was among a handful of American sheriffs invited to the country by the American Israel Education Foundation to learn about the U.S. relationship with Israel and get a better grasp of security concerns.
"The purpose of the trip (was) to teach us about American-Israeli relations and the current situation Israel is in, both politically and security-wise. And the trip was paid for by the American Israeli Education Foundation. And they are the ones that paid all of our expenses, 100 percent of the cost of me going there."
"There were 15 sheriffs, and several others from the United States (on the trip)," Wasylyshyn explained, "part of this trip dealt with homeland security. One of the people that went headed Homeland Security for the State of California under Arnold Schwarzenegger." Most of the sheriffs involved, including Wasylyshyn, were board members or others in the National Sheriff's Association.
"They sent us because they want us to learn about what's going on in Israel and the region."
The trip, lasting from May 12 to Sunday, Wasylyshyn said, focused on five main areas, including local and homeland security.
"We learned a lot about local security," he said, noting that the group met with numerous security directors from Israel's six regions, "including local security at the Tel-Aviv airport, which is a huge, obviously, international airport, which has many unique security issues, and we met with the director of that."
Prisons were another area of focus, as were international relations and the religious sites located in Israel.
"They look at us as leaders in our communities," he said.
Of the prison they visited - which included a compound itself consisting of three prisons and one jail, containing a total of 2,500 prisoners - Wasylyshyn noted "I was impressed that they allowed us to literally walk through the prisons, through the hallways, and they even allowed us to get into a cell with four inmates, four prisoners. And those prisoners were in there for very serious crimes."
The prison, he recalled, was in a remote portion of the country and was not air-conditioned at all. "But it was very sanitary" and had good ventilation.
Most striking for the Sheriff, however, was the Israeli take on security.
"I learned a lot about how they deal with security and their approach is more different than what we do in our country." In a nutshell, he said, in airports we Americans are focused on finding the bomb. But Israelis are focused on finding the bomber themselves.
While the Israelis have screening devices like those in airports in the U.S., they spend a larger amount of time looking for the individuals who would commit the acts and, when questioning suspects, paying very close attention to their reactions to their interrogation. He said that in one strategy, the Israelis will have a plainclothes agent waiting in line - perhaps disguised, he said, as a woman with a stroller - who will pay attention to conversations and what is being talked about before groups of people get to airport checkpoints.
"So a suicide bomber is not going to be talking about where they're going to be going for lunch next week," he said of an example of the kind of behavior looked for.
"Most of the time I felt extremely safe," Wasylyshyn noted of the trip, though he did state that the group did feel on edge twice - once in the village of Sderot, which overlooks the Gaza strip and has endured continual rocket attacks from members of Hamas - including one the night before their arrival; and also at a heavily-fortified checkpoint on the border with Syria.
"It felt very tense there," he said.

Comments

# 2012-05-23 11:35

This trip is complete right wing propaganda with NO value or merit to Wood county tax payers other than to have a duly elected official away from his duties and out of the country. Pure grandstanding. There is no way the sheriff should have gone on this special interest paid political junket.

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