PA TV praises attackers from 2000 Ramallah lynching — watchdog

An official Palestinian Authority television program recently honored three Palestinians who took part in the vicious lynching of a pair of Israeli reservists at the start of the Second Intifada, a media watchdog said.

During a June episode of the PA’s “Giants of Endurance,” the host of the program referred to Habbes Bayyoud, Muhammad Nawarah and Jawad Abu Qara as “heroic” for their involvement in the murders of soldiers Yosef Avrahami and Vadim Norzhich, according to Palestinian Media Watch.

The host also interviewed the sister of Muhammad Nawarah, who said she was proud of her brother.

“Muhammad is a handsome guy and makes one proud. I am proud that I have a brother like Muhammad… Thanks to him, we raise our heads and feel proud” she said, according to the PMW translation released Thursday.

Bayyoud is serving two life sentences in Israeli prison for his role in the killings, PMW noted, while Nawarah is serving a life sentence and Abu Qara 25 years.

Avrahami and Norzhich were killed in October 2000 after they took a wrong turn and ended up in the Palestinian Authority-controlled city of Ramallah in the West Bank at the start of the Second Intifada.

The two men were viciously beaten to death and their bodies were mutilated.

The brutal lynching was caught on film by an Italian TV crew, with the footage of one of the attackers standing at a window to display his blood-stained hands to the mob below becoming one of the most notorious images from the Second Intifada.