Palestinian charged with 'deliberate killing' of IDF soldier with brick

In court, Nazmi Abu Bakr denies throwing stone that killed Amit Ben-Ygal, 21, during a West Bank raid in May

A Palestinian man was on Thursday indicted at a military court for the “deliberate killing” of an Israeli soldier with a brick during a West Bank raid last month.

At the court hearing, 49-year-old Nazmi Abu Bakr, burst into tears and denied killing 21-year-old Sgt. First Class Amit Ben-Ygal.

“It is not true what is being blamed on me, the indictment is not true, I did not do it. Who wrote it?” he said, according to Hebrew-language media. “I told the investigators everything. How did they write such a thing?”

Abu Bakr’s attorney appealed to the dead soldier’s family, saying: “The value of life is of the utmost importance. We share in your grief.”

Nazmi Abu Bakr, 49, is suspected of throwing the rock that killed IDF soldier Amit Ben Ygal (Shin Bet)

But Ben-Ygal’s father Baruch condemned the lawyer’s plea.

“Tell that to the killer. This man murdered my son — don’t contact me. You are a hypocrite and your hypocrisy is not working on me. You should be ashamed of yourself — you represent a murderer,” he said, according to Channel 13 news.

The Shin Bet security service said last month that Abu Bakr confessed to being the one who threw the brick that killed Ben-Ygal during the West Bank raid. He was arrested along with several other people who were believed to have been in the building at the time, and confessed several weeks later, according to the security agency.

The soldier was killed in the predawn hours of May 12, after the Golani Reconnaissance Battalion carried out a series of arrests in Yabed.

According to the IDF’s initial investigation, as the Golani Reconnaissance Battalion was making its way out of the town at roughly 4:30 a.m. Ben-Ygal apparently heard a sound coming from one of the rooftops on the outskirts of the village and looked up.

As he did, exposing his face, someone on the roof of the three-story building threw the brick at him, the IDF said.

Baruch Ben-Ygal, the father of Sgt. Amit Ben-Ygal, and other family and friends mourn at the slain soldier’s funeral in Beer Yaakov cemetery, May 12, 2020. (Yossi Aloni/Flash90)

The indictment stated that Abu Bakr intentionally threw the brick in the direction of the IDF soldier’s voices with the intention of causing death.

“As the block was being thrown, [Ben-Ygal], who was walking with his comrades at the time, looked up at the building and was hit in the head with great force,” the indictment read.

Ben-Ygal was fatally wounded by the brick. He received treatment at the scene before being flown by helicopter to Haifa’s Rambam Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

Israeli troops measure the home of a Palestinian man suspected of killing a soldier with a brick last month, in the West Bank village of Yabed on June 11, 2020. (Israel Defense Forces)

The Israel Defense Forces earlier this month began preparing to demolish Abu Bakr’s home.

Home demolitions are a controversial policy that the IDF says helps deter future terror attacks. Over the years, a number of Israeli defense officials have questioned the efficacy of the practice and human rights activists have denounced it as unfair collective punishment. They are often carried out before conviction.

Judah Ari Gross contributed to this report.