In Israel, the unthinkable crime:
A gang of [color="Red"]neo-Nazi Jews on a rampage of violence
http://www.startribune.com/722/story/1411891.html

JERUSALEM - Swastikas scrawled on a synagogue. "Sieg Heil" shouted on the street. Minorities kicked into unconsciousness.

Israeli police announced Sunday that they have busted a local gang of neo-Nazis who authorities say are responsible for a string of crimes, including attacks on [color="red"]fellow Jews and on minorities that Israelis thought would never happen in the country founded after the horrors of the Holocaust.

"Unbelievable," read Sunday's headline in one Jerusalem newspaper, above a photograph of six young men raising their arms in the Nazi salute.

Police last week arrested eight suspects, whose names have not been released but whose ages range from 16 to 20. A gag order concerning the case was lifted Sunday, when a local court remanded the group to three days further custody. The suspects covered their faces with their shirts during the hearing.

"We didn't beat anyone," protested Arik Benyatov, 20, the gang's alleged leader, claiming his innocence.

The suspects are all Israeli immigrants from the former Soviet Union whose Jewish ancestry, although slight, qualified them for citizenship.

The group is accused of attacking at least 15 people, including foreign workers of Asian descent and Orthodox Jewish students, according to police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld. He said the group is also responsible for vandalizing two synagogues in March 2006.

Ina Flix, whose son Alex is one of the suspects, told Israel Radio that her son was not a Nazi supporter and considered the arrests a witch hunt against Israel's Russian-speaking community.

Legal experts said the young men could be deported if judged to have committed acts that constitute a breach of loyalty toward the state and the foundation of its existence.

Israeli television stations showed footage seized by the police showing several young men surrounding a Russian-born heroin addict and ordering him to kneel and beg forgiveness for being a Jew and a junkie. Then they pounded him with their fists.

Police said that the suspects will be indicted on assault and vandalism charges, because Israel, unlike most European countries, does not have a hate crimes law.

"We thought that it would never happen here, but it has, and we have to deal with it," said Amos Herman, an official with the Jewish Agency, which works on behalf of the government to encourage immigration.

But Zalman Gilchinsky, an Israeli who has been documenting neo-Nazi groups for several years, said they are more common than Israeli leaders are willing to admit.

"There are such groups in nearly every city in Israel," he said on Israel radio.

"This group was perhaps a little careless and a little too violent, and this is why they got caught."

The Los Angeles Times and Associated Press contributed to this report.