PA team to monitor condition of mother injured in Duma attack

Palestinian doctors charged with making emergency decisions regarding Riham Dawabsha, who is said to be ‘clinically dead’

By ToI Staff 6 September 2015, 5:01 pm

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Saad and Riham Dawabsha, with baby Ali (Channel 2 screenshot)

The Palestinian Authority is preparing to send a medical team to evaluate and monitor the condition of Riham Dawabsha, a Palestinian woman critically injured in a firebombing attack in July and hospitalized at Tel Hashomer hospital near Tel Aviv since.

Her family members told the Al-Jazeera network on Sunday that she was “clinically dead,” following a sharp deterioration in her condition confirmed by her Israeli medical team Saturday.

Dawabsha, 26, sustained third-degree burns on 90 percent of her body and was left fighting for her life after assailants — police suspect they were Jewish extremists — hurled a firebomb through the window of the family home in the West Bank city of Duma on July 31, killing her 18-month-old son Ali. Her husband, Saad, was also critically wounded and died days later. The family’s other son, five-year-old Ahmed, is being treated at Tel Hashomer for massive burns.

Ahmed’s condition has improved, and he has been seen on Israeli TV speaking and eating, and asking about his parents.

A relative holds up a photo of a one-and-a-half year old boy, Ali Dawabsha, in the family house torched in a suspected attack by Jewish terrorists in Duma village near the West Bank city of Nablus, Friday, July 31, 2015. The boy died in the fire, his four-year-old brother and parents were badly hurt. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)

The Palestinian medical team sent to monitor Riham Dawabsha will be headed by Dr. Kamal al-Shakhra from the PA Health Ministry and Eyhab Zeitawi from the Civil Affairs Ministry, according to the Palestinian news agency Ma’an.

The team will be charged with making “decisions in case of any emergency,” according to PA Health Minister Jawwad Awwad.

Five-year-old Ahmed Dawabsha lies in his hospital bed at The Chaim Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer, August 24, 2015 (Eric Cortellessa/Times of Israel)

The terror attack on July 31 shook Israeli society.

Israeli politicians roundly condemned the attack but some opposition MKs from left-wing parties accused right-wing lawmakers and the government of generating a public atmosphere that enabled the attack. President Reuven Rivlin said Israel had been lax in fighting Jewish terrorism.

In the wake of the attack, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon approved the use of arrest without charges against Jewish terror suspects. The tactic is often used against Palestinian suspects.

Several such arrests of right-wing activists have been made but none has been linked directly to the attack in Duma.