LOD, Israel – An Israeli settler was sentenced Monday to three years in prison and 20 years in prison for killing a Palestinian couple and their young son in a July 2015 arson attack on their home.
The attack on the Dawabsheh family in the northwestern village of Duma frightened Palestinians, who have long viewed Israel’s weak stance on colonial violence.
But people on both sides were shocked by the horrific nature of the killings, and even condemned Israeli leaders. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called it an act of terrorism.
In addition to the prison sentence, a three-judge panel of Central Israel’s Lod District Court ordered the settler, Amiram Ben-Uliel, 26, to pay compensation to members of the Dawabsheh family within 90 days.
Judge Ruth Lorch said Mr Ben-Yuliel did not “spontaneously” commit a “negligent act”, but that his actions were “jointly planned and held by racism and a fundamentalist ideology.”
Mr Ben-Yuliel delivered the sentence via video conference. Immediately after Judge Lorch read the verdict, Mr. Ben Yuliel’s wife, Oria, condemned the judges.
“Shame on you all!” She screamed.
“You are all murderers,” replied a supporter of the Davabsheh family.
In May, judges convicted Mr. Ben-Yuliel of murder, attempted murder, arson, and “conspiracy to commit a racist crime.”
Saad Dawabsheh, 32, and Reham Dawabsheh, 27, were killed in the attack, along with their 18-month-old son, Ali. His eldest son Ahmed was 5 years old at the time of the attack, but he was badly burned, but he survived.
In its judgment, the court found that Mr. Ben-Yuliel had planned the attack in retaliation for the shooting, in which the colony was killed about a month earlier. The court said it had admitted creeping through Olive Grove and bypassed several Palestinian Palestinian homes to attack the heart of the village and create more danger.
Using bottles of grape juice to make a fire bomb, Mr. Ben-Yuliel attacked a building, not knowing it was empty, to find the court. He then targeted another house where the Davabsheh family was sleeping.
Neighbors who heard the screams rushed to the house and saw Mr. Davbasheh crawling on the ground outside and his wife on fire. His youngest son was already dead, and Ahmed could be heard screaming from inside.
The verdict said Mr Ben-li Liel sprayed “revenge” and “live messiah” on the walls of the family home in Hebrew.
Witnesses said they saw two masked men burning in the family. A teenager, whose name has not been released because he was a minor at the time of the attack, struck a deal last year, admitting he conspired to carry out racially motivated arson in exchange for dropping murder charges against lawyers.
The state’s chief prosecutor, Yale Atzam, said a “significant” message was sent to the sentencing hearing on Monday that those who carry out racially motivated attacks would be severely punished regardless of their own identities. The court’s message, she said: “Terror is terror.”
However, human rights groups say that while Israel has taken further steps to prosecute the perpetrators of Jewish violence against Palestinians in the most horrific cases, it has invested some resources to prevent a wider problem.
“The authorities have created an environment that allows for the escalation of perpetual violence,” said Lyor Amihai, executive director of Yash Din, an Israeli human rights group. “We see new cases every week that never come to court.”
Yeshe Din reported in December that since 2005, only 8 percent of Palestinians have been charged in more than 1,200 investigations into alleged violence by Jewish Israelis.
On Monday evening, Mr. Netanyahu’s son Yer, whose social media posts are frequently disputed, retweeted a post pointing out he was part of an effort to crack down on nationalist right-wingers and immigrants. The post includes a link to an online campaign to raise funds for Mr. Ben-Uliel’s legal expenses.
Yitzhak Bam, a lawyer representing Mr Ben-Uliel, said his client had to appeal Monday’s sentence to the Supreme Court.
On the brink of tears, Reham’s father, Hussein Dawabsheh, said he would not miss his daughter, son-in-law and grandson. And his surviving grandson, he said, still suffers from his burns.
“It didn’t bring back my happiness as far as I’m concerned,” he said. “He didn’t bring anything back to me.”
