2023-08-06 09:19:33
Lawyers for two outpost residents suspected of killing a Palestinian in a West Bank clash said on Saturday they acted in self-defense after a mob they said attacked them, them and other Israelis.
They were identified Saturday night as Elisha Yered, a former spokesperson for MK Limor Son Har-Melech of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, and Yehiel Indore.
Indore is suspected of being the person who shot 19-year-old Qusai Jamal Matan. Yered is suspected of interfering in the investigation.
A court extended the two men’s pretrial detention until Wednesday.
On Friday evening, Matan was shot in the neck outside the West Bank town of Burqa, near Ramallah, on private Palestinian land, according to Palestinian health officials and Israeli defense sources. He was buried on Saturday. According to the official Palestinian Authority (PA) news agency, Wafa, the clashes erupted after outpost residents attacked the village, leading residents to confront them.
Right-wing legal aid group Honenu said “dozens of Arab attackers” targeted a Jewish shepherd and others who had come from the illegal outpost of Oz Zion on Friday to help them, Palestinians who used stones, clubs and firecrackers.
Qusai Jamal Matan. (Authorisation)
Honenu said the prime suspect – later identified as Indore – was seriously injured after being hit in the head by a rock that was thrown in his direction. He was operated and suffers from a cranial fracture and an intra-cerebral haemorrhage. Police officers remained permanently next to his bed in the intensive care unit of the hospital.
Yered is a resident of the illegal outpost of Migron in the West Bank, while Indor lives in the settlement of Ofra.
Honenu’s statement said that after Indor was injured, “with his last strength, the resident managed to defend himself with his personal weapon – for which he holds a license”. The statement added that the second suspect, Yered, helped evacuate Indore and took him to an ambulance.
“My client acted in accordance with the law and as required by any holder of a license to carry a weapon – to defend his life and that of other citizens”, declared Me Nati Rom.
Rom urged authorities to arrest and charge the Palestinians involved in the clash. ” It’s a miracle. My client is the victim of a serious terrorist attack. Thanks to his ingenuity, he and his friends are alive today… It was an attempt to assassinate a group of Jews – a real lynching. »
Mourners carry the body of 19-year-old Palestinian Qusai Jamal Matan during his funeral in the West Bank town of Burqa on August 5, 2023. (Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP)
The IDF said witnesses said clashes erupted near Burqa after residents of a nearby illegal outpost grazed sheep in the area. Palestinians in the town then approached the Israelis to drive them off their land, and a verbal confrontation ensued. At one point the two sides started throwing stones at each other, the army said, adding that the Palestinians also threw firecrackers.
“During the confrontation, Israeli civilians fired at the Palestinians. Following the confrontation, one Palestinian was killed, four others were injured, and a Palestinian vehicle was found burned,” the IDF said in a statement on Saturday.
MK Har-Melech, Yered’s former employer, slammed the arrests, comparing Indor to a Tel Aviv city policeman killed Saturday night by a Palestinian terrorist in the coastal city.
“When a policeman in Tel Aviv kills a terrorist, he is applauded by all security officials, but when a Jew defends his life in [Cisjordanie] in the face of an Arab mob rising up to kill him, he is arrested while still injured,” she tweeted.
Otzma MK Yehudit Limor Son Har-Melech during a Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem on February 23, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
“I suggest that the security services focus their efforts on the nests of terrorism instead of pursuing settlers who cling to our land with devotion,” added Son Har-Melech.
Somewhat contradicting the settlers’ position, an unnamed security source told Ynet that Yered has been “heating the situation in the region for a long time, which has also led to an increase in terrorism and stone-throwing.”
The outlet noted that Yered had in the past called for the “wiping out” of Palestinian villages on social media as well as “blood revenge” for the attacks, saying that if the security forces did not do this, “good Jews” would.
Earlier this year, he was named by Channel 14 – a television channel that has taken an undisguised right-wing stance and is favored by many politicians in the current government – as one of the “young most promising Israelis.
Meanwhile, the IDF on Saturday dismissed claims by settlers that troops were slow to arrive on the scene.
“Claims that the IDF and security forces lagged are false and unfounded,” the Israeli military said.
Mourners cry after taking a last look at the body of 19-year-old Qusai Matan during his funeral in the West Bank village of Burqa, east of Ramallah, August 5, 2023. (Credit: Nasser Nasser/AP Photo)
According to the IDF, the camps began gathering in Burqa around 7 p.m. At 8:07 p.m., the army received an initial Palestinian report of a clash in the area.
Troops were then sent to the scene, but could not find them “because the location they had received was wrong”, according to the IDF statement.
At 8:52 p.m., the army said it heard for the first time from settlers about fighting between Palestinians and residents of the nearby Oz Zion outpost. The soldiers received the appropriate coordinates seventeen minutes later and arrived at the scene at 9:20 p.m., “after the shooting”.
Fearing further violence, the Israeli military declared on Saturday that the area of the fatal incident was a closed military zone and stationed a number of soldiers there.
The office of PA Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh demanded that the perpetrators “not escape punishment”.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid said in a statement that the West Bank was becoming a battleground between Jewish and Arab terrorists.
“The Hill Youth are turning Judea and Samaria into a battleground between the terror of Jewish terrorists and the terror of Arab terrorists,” he tweeted. “This endangers the settlements, which are mostly made up of law-abiding citizens, and our soldiers. The support they receive from the most extreme coalition in the history of the state [équivaut à] a diplomatic attack. »
“Netanyahu should strongly condemn violence that undermines national security, the IDF and the settlements,” Lapid said.
Israeli settlers going wild in a Palestinian village near Ramallah on August 4, 2023. (Twitter screenshot)
“It is time to say it loud and clear: the Netanyahu government includes supporters of terrorism and terror. If he wants to evict the families of terrorists, he can start by evicting the family of the resident terrorist,” said MP Merav Michaeli and leader of the opposition party, Avoda.
Hussein al-Sheikh, PA civil affairs minister and general secretary of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) executive committee, called for Otzma Yehudit to be designated as a “terrorist party”.
PLO Executive Committee Secretary General Hussein al-Sheikh giving an interview to The Associated Press at his office in Ramallah on June 13, 2022. (Nasser Nasser/AP Photo)
“We call on the international community and international institutions to consider the party of terrorist Itamar Ben Gvir as a terrorist party because of his personal and partisan history of inciting the murder of Palestinians,” al-Sheikh tweeted on Saturday.
The United Nations envoy for the Middle East, Tor Wennesland, on Saturday strongly condemned “the deplorable acts of violence by settlers” and called for “perpetrators [soient] held accountable”. Wennesland also condemned Saturday’s deadly terror attack in Tel Aviv, saying “nothing can justify acts of terrorism.”
Friday’s attack came after several other Palestinians were killed in disputed circumstances involving settlers. In June, a Palestinian was shot and killed during a rampage of violence by settlers in Turmus Ayya, after a deadly attack, and in February, a Palestinian was killed during a riot by residents settlements in Huwara, after a terrorist shooting.
Also in February, the Shin Bet internal security agency joined police in investigating the murder of a Palestinian near Qarawat Bani Hassan in the West Bank, allegedly committed by Israeli settlers.
Violence by settlers has escalated in recent months, with the United Nations reporting on Friday nearly 600 attacks on Palestinians and their property over the past six months.
The riots were condemned by a number of politicians, including some members of the hard-right coalition, but there was no clear condemnation from settler leaders.
The government has pledged to hold accountable those behind the settler riots. Two suspects have been charged in the Turmus Ayya riot in June. Five Israelis have been placed in administrative detention for their involvement.
Hundreds of people were filmed taking part in the attacks.
Emanuel Fabian contributed to this article.
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