2nd 'Prisoner X' in Isolation in Israel Prison

A second "Prisoner X" who is being held in top-secret conditions in an Israeli jail has been detained in total isolation for many years, the Israeli media reported on Thursday.

The prisoner, whose identity has not been revealed even to the guards, is locked in a high security cell with no windows in Ayalon prison near Tel Aviv, reports said, adding that he is only allowed a brief walk alone in a courtyard surrounded by a wall.

Like Israeli-Australian spy Ben Zygier, who hanged himself in December 2010 in a neighboring cell in the same prison, the second "Prisoner X" is monitored by cameras 24 hours to prevent a possible suicide.

The chairman of the Committee on Defense and Foreign Affairs in parliament, Avigdor Lieberman, said the second "Prisoner X" faces "extremely grave" accusations but he stressed that the rights of Israeli prisoners are respected.

Avigdor Feldman, a lawyer who visited Zygier just days before his death and who specializes in security cases, said the case against the second prisoner was "worse than Ben Zygier's case".

It involves "a very serious breach of security," one report quoted Feldman as saying.

"When I read the details, I was shocked as an Israeli citizen," he added.

The mysterious arrest and death of Zygier, an alleged Mossad spy, had shocked Israel and Australia when news of it hit headlines in February.

Zygier, who was initially referred to as "Prisoner X" before the Australian press identified him as an agent for Israel's shadowy Mossad spy service, was found hanged in a supposedly suicide-proof cell in Block 15 of Ayalon prison with Israel going to extreme lengths to cover up his existence and the reason for his imprisonment.

When Zygier's story hit the headlines in February, Israel's Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch insisted that there were no more prisoners being held incognito.

On Wednesday a member of the Meretz party, Zeeva Galon, accused Aharonovitch of having "lied before parliament" but the minister insisted that prisoners in Israel enjoyed the protection of the law.

"Some cases cannot be publicly disclosed without affecting national security," Aharonovitch said, adding that there were no prisoners in Israel "whose existence is hidden from the courts".

Court documents cited by Haaretz newspaper this week said the second prisoner had already been convicted without saying what his crime was.

Haaretz said the documents showed the second prisoner was being held in Block 13 of Ayalon prison and that like Zygier, his case was being handled by the Shin Bet internal security service and the prison's intelligence officers.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, which broke the original story about Zygier said he had been arrested after unwittingly sabotaging a top-secret spy operation to bring home the bodies of Israeli soldiers missing in Lebanon.