3 Israelis indicted over ‘revenge’ arson attack on Arabs
2 accused of vandalizing vehicles, spraying ‘price tag’ graffiti; third charged with not preventing a crime
Stuart Winer is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.
The Northern District prosecution filed indictments Tuesday against three teenagers accused of carrying out vandalism and arson attacks in an Arab town.
The defendants, all aged 15, are accused of setting fire to vehicles and spraying belligerent slogans in the northern Arab town of Yafia six weeks ago, apparently as revenge for an attack in a Tel Aviv market last month in which two Palestinian gunmen shot dead four people and injured over a dozen.
Two of the defendants were indicted for vandalizing a vehicle for racist motives, arson, and obstruction of justice. The third stands accused of failing to prevent a crime.
The teens were from the northern communities of Carmiel and Balfouria and the West Bank settlement of Alon Moreh. They have not been identified in media because they are minors.
They were nabbed by the police’s nationalist crimes unit for setting two cars on fire and spray painting “price tag” and “revenge” on other vehicles in a car dealership in the community near Nazareth.
The suspects confessed to the charges and said their motive was retaliation for the Sarona terror attack.
Channel 10 reported that the defendants’ attorney said they were held under “inhuman conditions, in small cells, and were questioned most of the day. There is a strong suspicion that they admitted to things that they didn’t commit at all.”
On June 8, cousins Muhammad and Khalid Muhamra opened fire in the Sarona Market entertainment area in the heart of Tel Aviv, killing Ido Ben Ari, Ilana Naveh, Michael Feige and Mila Mishayev, and wounding over a dozen others. They fled the scene but were captured by private security guards and police a short time later.
The two Palestinian men, along with a third, Younis Ayash Musa Zayn, who had assisted and planned to join them, were charged with murder in a Tel Aviv District Court earlier this month.
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