Hajj Says KSA Wanted Her Fired, Ghabash Says 'Coordinated' with Her on Itani

Suspended Internal Security Forces officer Lt. Col. Suzanne al-Hajj on Thursday told the Military Court that interrogators had showed her “a paper issued by the Saudi intelligence command” asking Lebanese authorities to hand her the “severest penalties” and “expel” her from her post as head of the ISF anti-cyber crime bureau.

MTV meanwhile reported that Hajj stressed in her testimony that she “never had any form of ties” to the hacker Elie Ghabash, who is accused of having fabricated the electronic evidence that landed the actor Ziad Itani in jail on charges of spying for Israel.

“This is the first time that Suzanne al-Hajj was allowed to defend herself,” the TV network said.

“Elie Ghabash backed down on his previous testimony as his lawyer announced that Ghabash was not in good health in the previous session,” MTV added.

“Ghabash was distracted in the previous session and I did not know that he had been in hospital and today I asked the court that he be examined by a medical committee,” the lawyer told the TV network, adding that his client had taken medication prior to the previous session.

MTV added that it was “proved” in Thursday's session that Ghabash had sent Itani messages from a fake Israeli Facebook account and that the actor had no ability to open them due to the fact that they were “encrypted.”

“The goal was to only bring him to interrogation and intimidate him and it wasn't to implicate him in a spying for Israel case,” Ghabash himself told the court.

Ghabash also told the court that he had received $1,600 from the State Security agency in return for “the information he offered about Ziad Itani” and had been promised to get $5,000 in return for submitting similar information implicating the journalist Radwan Murtada in a similar case.

The hacker, however, refrained from working on Murtada's offer after his previous action entangled Itani in a case bigger than he had been hoping for, he told the court.

And as he confessed to “coordinating” with al-Hajj who had asked him to “search for evidence linking Itani to the Israelis,” Ghabash denied “receiving any sum of money” from the officer in return for that.

The trial of Hajj and Ghabash was later adjourned to February 21.

While Ghabash is still in detention, Hajj was conditionally released several weeks ago. The ISF's disciplinary council for its part has issued a decree sending Hajj to retirement but the decision was suspended after she filed an appeal.

According to media reports, Hajj had sought to take revenge on Itani for publishing a screenshot of a 'like' she had placed on a tweet by controversial TV director Charbel Khalil.

The 'like' cost Hajj her job as head of the ISF anti-cybercrime unit.

In the 2017 tweet, Khalil had quipped that “Saudi women are only allowed to drive if the car is booby-trapped.”