Calls from right-wing politicians come as a Palestinian suspect is charged with murder and sexual assault
February 11, 2019 18:07
The brutal murder of 19-year-old Ori Ansbacher near Jerusalem on Thursday has played into the feverish atmosphere on the Israeli right in the election campaign.
The Shin Bet security agency said on Sunday evening that Arafat Irfaiya, 29, the alleged murderer and a resident of Hebron, was acting out of “nationalistic motives”.
He is to be charged with murder and sexual assault.
Ms Ansbacher was fulfilling her national service as a guide at the Ein Yael open-air museum and educational center, south-east of Jerusalem.
Police say the suspect attacked, sexually assaulted and stabbed her to death, after approaching her as she was sitting alone on a bench in the wood next to Ein Yael. He then fled to Ramallah, where he hid in a mosque.
Mr Irfaiya was captured on Friday night in a joint operation by the Shin Bet, IDF and the police’s special counter-terrorism unit.
When questioned he denied any ideological motives, but Shin Bet believe that he was motivated to carry out an attack against Israel: he has been arrested twice in the past for carrying for a knife and was sentenced in one case to six months in prison for planning to carry out a terror attack.
His family is affiliated with Hamas, but no Palestinian organisation claimed responsibility for the murder.
For three days after Ms Ansbacher's body was found on Thursday evening there was a gag-order on most of the details, leading to feverish speculation on social media.
Her funeral was held on Friday and politicians visited the shiva, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Avigdor Lieberman, the former defence minister and leader of right-wing Yisrael Beiteinu party.
Mr Lieberman, who left the coalition last year in protest of what he claimed was the government’s soft attitude towards Palestinian terror, used the opportunity to call for the death sentence against the suspect, a long-held demand of his party.
Another right-wing politician responding to the murder was Education Minister Naftali Bennett, leader of the New Right Party, who took the opportunity to call on Mr Netanyahu to enact a recently-passed law which cut from the funds the Palestinian Authority receives from Israel to correspond with the stipends it pays Palestinian prisoners.
Mr Bennett claimed that were Arafat Irfaiya to receive a life sentence, his family will receive 12,000 shekels (£2,560) a month from the Palestinian Authority.
Mr Netanyahu too has expressed his support for the law, but there are legal issues: cutting the money that Israel transfers to Ramallah is part of an international agreement over the payment of tariffs for goods imported by the Palestinians.
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