Just out of curiosity, what kind of processing were you expecting? I was just wondering because she had searched your bag, found the item in question and apparently disposed of it. What else is there to do? (Besides actually saying, "OK, you're done now.") And what was the supervisor supposed to check for if the lighter was already gone?

I think the answer to your post is quite apparent, if you go back and read carefully what the OP wrote.

I agree. When I travel it's my own business. If government agencies were paying my fare they might have a right to know. I really don't think it's alright to badger passengers like that, unless there is a valid reason to believe they are doing something. I hate hearing justifications based on them "giving" back a bottle of water or allowing the use of real steak knives. Big deal. That doesn't make up for the 2 hours of intrusive questioning. Then again, Big Brother should know everything....right???

I agree with that your security was done correctly although in my opinion overboard.

But a friend of the family who is a 84 year old lady travelling to Israel to visit her son who at the time was working as a diplomat stationed in Israel was forced to open her private letters which security opened and had translated. After that they examined her body cavities by hand Enough said.

I know the israelis are cautious and absolutely have the right to be but that's just crazy.

Oy vey, what an imposition. I think magnetometers, x-ray machines, and sniffer dogs doing frequent and complete terminal sweeps is all that is needed.

My small terminal at a small airport has more flights before noon than El Al has all day, worldwide (35-40).

With all due respect, I do not believe a word of this post.

You're too polite. It's pure bullsh!t.

So they put a lady through a puffer and she calls it a gas chamber:

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7...407841,00.html

but they basically rape an 84 year-old lady and call it "security". Uh huh.

They examined her scrupulously. At least they didn't examine her unscrupulously. Oh wait, this is DHS/TSA.

Did they use some type of lubricant and change to clean gloves before this alleged violation occurred?

I said earlier that I don't believe a word of this story. Let me show why, and at the same time play the Devil's Advocate (with the DA's answers to my objections in bold face).

We only know for a fact that the OP has said he is Swedish, the woman is a friend of the family, and she was go to Israel to visit her diplomat son.

What airline was she flying?

El Al.

But El Al does not fly into Sweden or to any other Scandinavian country.

I didn't say that the friend of the family is Scandinavian. She comes from another country.

Germany used to (and might still, for all I know), pat down all passengers, on all airlines, going to Israel. Is it possible that is what happened and the story was exaggerated?

No, she was not flying from Germany. It was another country.

There is no country in the world where El Al does body cavity searches. It is an airline, not a government organization, and has no such authority. At most, it can ask for such a search from local authorities (as it did in the Richard Reid case). Why did the local government agree to give this 84-year-old woman the cavity search?

I wasn't clear in my my original statement. Yes, I said she was travelling to Israel to visit her son but in fact she was on her way back. The cavity search was performed in Israel. Security for all airlines there is conducted by the same government employees.

Israel uses body cavity searches only in the most extreme cases. Even most young, Arab, males are not searched in this way. It only happens if the passenger has proven very suspicious during questioning and can not provide any proof for what he is saying. This is true in all cases, but would obviously be even more so for the relative of a foreign diplomat. Why didn't her son show his credentials and say something?

He didn't take her to the airport. She came by herself by taxi.

They would ask for his telephone number. Why didn't she give it to them?

She did but he was not at home or at the office. He does not have a mobile phone.

Then why didn't she ask them to call the Embassy? Anybody there could have confirmed who her son is and it is very doubtful that not a single person in the Embassy knew her.

This was in the very early morning hours -- about 5 a.m. Nobody was on duty at the embassy.

And her son was not at home?

Right. He went out for an early morning fishing trip.

This still doesn't sound right. Why would she agree to have this body cavity search? All she had to do is refuse to board the flight and come back, with her son or somebody else from the Embassy, to get on a later one?

She had to get back right away. She had a very hot date with a man she had met at the airport on the way to Israel. Hey! I said she was 84, I didn't say she was dead!

And you say extreme cases happen?

Yes. Had a Richard Reid type tried to get on an airplane in Israel, he would probably get a cavity search. In fact, while I don't know this for a fact I would presume that he was given exactly such a search on his return flight.

Before that, however, every other possibility of clearing someone would be tried.

I have a number of Israeli Arab friends, most of them male, and not one has been subjected to such a search. Moreover, I used to be responsible for the volunteers on my kibbutz. Fully 90% were Europeans, another 5% Americans, and the rest from various Asian countries. All were young and very few were Jewish. I know for a fact that none was given a cavity search coming into Israel and never heard of any getting one on the return trip.

He left by ground to Gaza then Egypt.

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=300

Thanks. That puts an end to the question of whether he was searched at TLV.