Man who murdered Arab teen in 2023 roadside altercation sentenced to 22 years

Dennis Mokin, who killed 19-year-old Diar Umari in a May 2023 road rage incident, is sentenced to 22 years in prison.

The Nazareth District Court also orders Mokin to pay Umari’s family NIS 258,000 ($84,500) in damages.

Mokin, a resident of the northern Jewish community of Gan Ner, fatally shot Umari, of the neighboring Arab community of Sandala, during a roadside argument in the area on May 6, 2023, and continued shooting at Umari even as the teenager tried to get back to his car.

Umari collapsed in a pool of blood and died as Mokin, who was driving drunk, left the scene, and later returned with his sister, whom he asked to lie to police and say that she had been the one driving.

The shooting, which was caught on camera, sparked outrage in Arab society.

In a two-to-one ruling in December, the judges in the case convicted Mokin of murder with depraved indifference rather than intent, because he fired the fatal shot when Umari was trying to pry away his gun.

Umari’s parents slammed the ruling at the time, saying their son was killed intentionally.

Umari’s father Ahmed tells the Arab48 news site after the sentencing that the punishment, given the “murderous settler criminal, who hates our Arab people,” will not “quench our thirst, nor the thirst of our people, family and countrymen, for retribution.”

Gan Ner is not a settlement and is located in Israel proper.

“Our wound will keep bleeding forever,” Ahmed says.