We regret his actions, gay parade stabber’s mother tells victim’s family

The mother of the man who stabbed six marchers at the annual Jerusalem gay pride parade regrets her son’s actions, she told the family of the teenage girl killed in the attack.

“We think it’s really a great tragedy, we regret it very much and pray for the recovery of the wounded,” Rivka Schlissel told family members of Shira Banki, 16, who died of her wounds three days after the July 30 attack, during a meeting Tuesday, the Walla news website reported.

Yishai Schlissel, an ultra-Orthodox man from Modiin Illit in the West Bank, remains in police custody after being deemed psychologically fit to be incarcerated. Schlissel had been released from prison three weeks earlier after serving 10 years for a similar attack at Jerusalem’s 2005 gay pride parade.

On Wednesday, the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court ordered Schlissel to undergo a second psychiatric evaluation to determine his fitness for trial.

Schlissel’s family and some members of his Haredi community remain under investigation by the Jerusalem District Police, who are working to discover whether others knew of his intention to attack parade marchers, according to Walla. Investigators are also checking calls made to and from his cellphone in the days leading up to the attack.