Israel seals off Hebron home of Palestinian car-rammer

The Border Police and IDF sealed off the Hebron home of a Palestinian man who killed a Border Policeman in a vehicular attack in November, the army said Tuesday morning.

Border Police officers, accompanied by IDF soldiers and representatives from the Civil Administration, carried out the closure of the home of Ibrahim Samir Skafi in the early morning hours on Monday on orders from the government, the army said in a statement.

The officers sealed off the home and filled the interior with a rigid foam and barbed wire.

Skafi was shot dead by security forces after ramming his vehicle into a group of Border Policemen at the West Bank’s Halhul Junction, near Hebron, on November 4.

Border Policeman Binyamin Yakobovich, 19, was badly hurt during the attack and died of his injuries in Jerusalem’s Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem shortly thereafter.

“I think that tonight is the closing of a circuit that sends a clear message to terrorist and their dispatchers,” Yakobovich’s commander, who led Tuesday morning’s mission, said in a statement.

“Despite the pain and difficulty that we have experienced with the passing of Binyamin — may his memory be blessed — our security forces will come and exact justice on every terrorist,” the Border Police officer said.

The practice of sealing up homes as a punitive measure is sometimes used as an alternative to home demolitions carried out against families of Palestinian attackers.

The practice of razing homes has been criticized by various international groups as a form of collective punishment. Some critics claim that house demolitions may even motivate family members of terrorists to launch attacks themselves.

The Supreme Court, however, has repeatedly rejected such claims and accepted the security establishment’s stance that home demolitions serve as an effective deterrent measure for potential attackers.

Twenty-nine Israelis and three foreign nationals have been killed in a wave of Palestinian terrorism and violence since October. Around 170 Palestinians have also been killed, some two thirds of them while attacking Israelis, and the rest during clashes with troops, according to the Israeli army.

The houses of 12 Palestinian attackers have been destroyed since the start of the current wave of violence in September, in line with the Supreme Court’s rulings.