Police conduct an undercover operation into the chat group’s members after discovering a perpetrator of a Jerusalem stabbing attack belonged to the group
Following an undercover investigation, police arrested 18 members of a Whatsapp group called “The Road to Heaven” used by members to disseminate Islamic content inciting to violence.
Police discovered the group during an investigation into Ibrahim Mattar, a terrorist from Jabel Mukaber who stabbed two border policemen near the Lions’ Gate in the Old City of Jerusalem.
Ten of the suspects’ remands were extended by a court, while others were released on restricted conditions.
The group had 37 members, most from Jabel Mukaber, and many who personally knew Mattar.
One of the messages investigators recovered several days prior to Mattar’s attack read, “I tell the Israeli nation to utilize the time the Islamic nation is sleeping—when the Islamic nation awakens, it will retake in a second what was taken from it over the ages.”
Most of the group members questioned denied that they had a goal of inciting violence. “This is a religious group that reads verses of the Koran,” said one of its members, a 30-year-old resident of Jabel Mukaber.
However, a group administrator claimed during questioning that the name of the group referred to carrying out an attack being the way to heaven.
It is currently unclear if the investigation into the group will bring about indictments, but it has provided police with valuable intelligence in an era where it is difficult to predict and stop lone terrorists planning to commit an attack.
