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JERUSALEM — Friends and relatives of a U.S.-born Israeli arrested in Egypt on spy charges said Monday he is a law student in Atlanta with an avid interest in the Mideast — and not a Mossad agent out to sabotage Egypt’s revolution, as Egyptian authorities claim.
The arrest of 27-year-old Ilan Grapel has set off new fears in Israel that relations with Egypt will sour now that its longtime president, Hosni Mubarak, has been deposed.
Grapel’s mother and a fellow student said he arrived in Cairo only in May. Late Monday, the official Egyptian News Agency said the investigation showed he arrived in Egypt just before the protests began on Jan. 25 and was in the square where the protests were centered every day.
