Police arrested three suspects near the Druse community of Majdal Shams in northern Israel in connection with a large counterfeit operation producing passports and identity cards. The arrests were made on Wednesday, 23 Nissan 5774. They report the suspects earned over a million shekels in the counterfeit operation.

In some cases the suspects used forged identity cards and submitted claims for workers compensation benefits due to work-related injuries.

Police report the quality of the forgeries was very high. The raid comes at a time when the Interior Ministry encourages citizens to take part in the voluntary biometric database program and request a biometric identity card and passport. Towards encouraging participation in the program officials offer the documents to applicants free of charge.

The biometric identity card and passport include photographing, fingerprinting and performing an eye scan of applicants, all part of the hi-tech technology used to prevent identity fraud in the future. Additional information is available on the Ministry of the Interior website at www.moin.gov.il.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)