Gonen Segev

Segev studied medicine at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.[1] He served in the Israel Defense Forces, beginning in a pilot course before transferring to an elite unit, and was discharged with the rank of captain.[1]

Segev was elected to the 13th Knesset in 1992 as a member of Rafael (Raful) Eitan's Tzomet party, serving in the opposition and sitting on the Knesset Finance Committee.[3] In February 1994, he publicly criticized what he described as the authoritarianism of the party's leader, precipitating a split that cost Tzomet three Knesset seats.[5] Along with Alex Goldfarb and Esther Salmovitz, he left Tzomet and formed a new faction, known variously as Yad or Yi'ud.[1][6]

The faction was described as nationalist and liberal in outlook, supporting the spirit of the Camp David Accords and Jewish settlement in the territories, while also advocating a referendum before any Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights.[6] Globes reported that the faction's three votes strengthened Yitzhak Rabin's coalition and enabled the Knesset to approve the Oslo Agreement; in return, Segev was appointed minister of energy and infrastructure.[1]

Segev joined Rabin's government in January 1995 and remained minister through the end of Shimon Peres's government in June 1996.[7][2] His ministerial responsibilities encompassed Israel's energy grid, national infrastructure projects, and oil refineries.[8] On February 1, 1996, he and U.S. Secretary of Energy Hazel R. O'Leary signed an agreement establishing a framework for bilateral collaboration in energy research and development.[9] He served in Israel's Twenty-Sixth Government, which ran from November 22, 1995, to June 18, 1996.[2] A National Library of Israel archival description records that he visited people wounded in what it calls a "suicide terror attack in Gaza" at Tel Hashomer Hospital.[10] Yad failed to win seats in the 1996 Knesset election and dissolved, and Segev retired from politics.[6]

After leaving politics, Segev worked as an adviser to the Eisenberg group for Israel Chemicals and Oil Refineries Ltd., including a company he had recently been responsible for regulating as energy minister.[1] In November 2003, he withdrew NIS 20,387 from Hong Kong ATMs using an Isracard credit card and then reported the card stolen; security-camera footage contradicted his account. He was convicted of attempted fraud and credit-card fraud and initially received a one-year suspended sentence and a NIS 50,000 fine; the conviction was upheld on appeal, but the fine was canceled.[3][11]

In April 2004, Segev was arrested on suspicion of attempting to smuggle 32,000 ecstasy tablets from Amsterdam to Israel.[3] The operation involved Segev, Ariel Friedman, and Moshe Werner. Werner transferred more than six kilograms of ecstasy to Segev at the Hilton hotel at Amsterdam's airport, with the drugs concealed in assorted packages, including M&M packaging.[11] After an airport officer recognized Segev from an earlier encounter, he stored the drugs in an airport locker and flew to Israel; Dutch authorities later found the drugs.[11] Werner died by suicide while in detention.[11]

In March 2005, the Tel Aviv District Court sentenced Segev to five years in prison, a two-year suspended sentence, and a fine of $27,500 under a plea agreement covering attempted drug smuggling, passport forgery, and related offenses.[3][11] Judge Uri Shoham expressed serious reservations about the agreement, including the prosecution's decision not to call fifteen Dutch witnesses, but ultimately accepted it, stating that Segev had acted out of "pure greed for money, which blinded his eyes."[11] Segev was released in June 2007 after one-third of his sentence was reduced for good behavior.[3] His medical license was permanently revoked in 2007; he later appealed and asked Health Minister Yaakov Litzman to restore it, but Litzman refused.[12][1]

Following his release from prison, Segev relocated to Nigeria and lived there during the years before his arrest.[3][12] According to the Shin Bet and police account published in 2018, his contact with people at Iran's embassy in Nigeria began in 2012. Investigators said he was recruited as an Iranian intelligence agent, traveled to Iran twice to meet handlers whose intelligence role he knew, and maintained contact with them through meetings in hotels and apartments in multiple countries.[12]

Investigators said Segev was provided with an encrypted communications system and transmitted information about Israel's energy sector, security sites, buildings, and diplomatic and security personnel.[12] They further alleged that he maintained contact with Israelis connected to security, defense, and foreign relations and attempted to introduce some of them to Iranian intelligence operatives while presenting the Iranians as businesspeople.[12] Other details of the case remained under a gag order.[1]

Segev denied acting for ideological or financial reasons and claimed that he had intended to function as a double agent working on Israel's behalf; the Shin Bet stated that it was unconvinced by this explanation.[8] His attorneys argued that the public account was disproportionately severe and that the classified portions of the indictment presented a different picture.[12]

In May 2018, Equatorial Guinea refused Segev entry because of his criminal record, and he was transferred to Israel at the request of Israeli police and arrested upon arrival.[12] The Jerusalem District Attorney's Office indicted him in the Jerusalem District Court on charges including aiding an enemy during wartime, espionage, and multiple counts of transmitting information to an enemy.[12] On February 26, 2019, Judge Rafi Carmel sentenced him to eleven years in prison under a plea agreement.[4] The amended indictment resulted in convictions for aggravated espionage on behalf of Iran and transmitting information to an enemy with intent to harm state security; the wartime-assistance charge was removed.[4] The court also imposed a suspended sentence, and the prosecution said that avoiding the exposure of intelligence methods and materials at a full trial was a central reason for accepting the agreement.[4]

Segev's public record combines a brief ministerial career with later criminal convictions. As energy minister, he signed the 1996 agreement that established a framework for U.S.-Israel collaboration in energy research and development.[9] Globes observed that his later criminal activity overshadowed his political career.[1] Under the 2019 plea agreement, he admitted acting for Iranian intelligence for five years and was convicted of aggravated espionage and transmitting information to an enemy with intent to harm state security.[4]

Sources differ on when precisely Segev joined Rabin's government. One Encyclopedia.com entry gives July 1994, while another states that he joined in January 1995.[6][7] Ynet reported that in 2002 Israeli security services uncovered a Hezbollah plot to lure and abduct Israelis, including Segev, and take them to Lebanon as bargaining chips. It said Segev had been warned about the plot by the Shin Bet.[3]

The specific intelligence Segev transmitted to Iran was partly withheld from publication, limiting public knowledge of the scope and sensitivity of his disclosures.[1][12] Reporting on the final charges was initially inconsistent: Ynet stated that he confessed and was convicted of aiding an enemy in wartime, yet the same report quoted his defense team as saying the treason charge had been removed from the amended indictment.[3] Calcalist's subsequent sentencing report stated that the wartime-assistance charge was removed and identified the final convictions as aggravated espionage and transmitting information to an enemy with intent to harm state security.[4]