Learn about the history of the Palestinian struggle for freedom, equality and justice by exploring major events in the history of their oppression on this day of the year.
28 November
JAIL FOR PALESTINIANS WHO KILLED MASS SHOOTER
On this day in 2013, Judge Schiff in Haifa District Court handed down jail sentences up to two years on seven Palestinian citizens of Israel. Eight years earlier they had overpowered and killed an Israeli soldier carrying out a massacre of Arabs. Eden Natan-Zada had shot dead a bus driver, another man and two sisters, and shot and wounded 21 other passengers. The prosecution refused to label the killer, Eden Natan-Zada, “a terrorist” because such a label would “disgrace the deceased.”
سجن الفلسطينيين الذين قتلوا منفذ مذبحة الفلسطينيين في اسرائيل
28 نوفمبر
في مثل هذا اليوم من عام 2013 ، أصدر القاضي شيف في محكمة حيفا المركزية أحكامًا بالسجن تصل إلى عامين على سبعة مواطنين فلسطينيين في إسرائيل. قبل ثماني سنوات ، كانوا قد تغلبوا على جندي إسرائيلي وقتلوه أثناء قيامه بتنفيذ مذبحة فلسطينيين اسرائيليين. قتل إيدن ناتان - زادا بالرصاص سائق حافلة ورجل آخر وشقيقتين ، وأطلق النار وأصاب 21 راكبا آخر. رفضت النيابة وصف القاتل ، إيدن ناتان زاده ، بأنه "إرهابي" لأن هذا الوصف من شأنه أن يكون"عار عليه"
Natan-Zada boarded the Shefa-'Amr-bound bus on 4 August 2005, dressed in full military uniform, carrying his army M16 rifle, and wearing the skullcap, beard, and sidelocks of an observant Jew, as well as an orange ribbon symbol of the Israeli right. When the bus arrived in Shefa-'Amr's primary Druze neighborhood, the killer stood up and approached the front door as if to get off, then turned, shot and killed the driver, a man sitting behind the driver, and two young women, wounding over twenty passengers.
One passenger grabbed the barrel of the killer's gun and he was subdued by passers-by at the scene of the bus shooting.
The four victims were Hazar Turki and Dina Turki, two sisters in their early twenties, and two men, Michel Bahus (the driver) and Nader Hayek; all were Arab citizens of Israel. The wounded were rushed to Rambam Medical Center in Haifa. In the days after the attack, 40,000 people attended a funeral service in honor of the victims in the town. The two sisters were buried in an Islamic cemetery, and the two men in the local Christian cemetery.
Israel Police opened a criminal investigation into the killing of Natan-Zada, a move condemned by the High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel. Knesset member Mohammad Barakeh noted: "Normally when someone stops a terrorist from continuing to kill he is considered a hero, but in this case it is the heroes who are sitting on the defense stand".
On 7 June 2009, twelve Palestinian citizens of Israel were charged with Natan-Zada's killing in Haifa District Court, seven charged with murder. Their lawyer, Maher Talhami, stated that aerial footage of the bus, recorded by an Israeli drone before, during and after Natan-Zada's attack took place indicates that Israeli military officers were aware of Natan-Zada's plan.
In July 2013, seven defendants charged with attempted murder were acquitted of that charge, but four were convicted of attempted manslaughter and two were convicted of aggravated battery, Three were sentenced to two years jail, one to 20 months, one to 18 months, and one to 11 months.
Presiding Judge Ilan Schiff dismissed issues of massively differential sentences for any Palestinian charged with killing a Jew, compared to a Jew (who might occasionally be) charged with killing a Palestinian: "We did not see fit to address past cases where Jews who were tried for similar offences were pardoned."
The brother of one accused brother told Ynet: "We've seen similar incidents of Jews who killed Palestinians and ended up being commended by the State… they don't deserve even one day on prison… they were only defending themselves."
Natan-Zada was a member of Kach, a Jewish terrorist group that the US STate Department categorises as 'terrorist'. The Israeli military ruled, however, that the four Palestinian Arab citizens whom Natan-Zada shot dead were not victims of terrorism because their killer was not part of a terrorist organization...Representatives of the Palestinian Arab community in Israel condemned this decision. Mohammed Barakeh, a Palestinian Arab member of the Israeli parliament, saying that the "…decision raises a strong scent of racism, which distinguishes between a Jewish terrorist and an Arab terrorist."
23-minute video: how Israeli law treats the murder of Palestinian citizens of Israel.
https://youtu.be/DO-z9dzoKrA