Palestinians file ICC report over deadly Duma firebombing

Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Riyad Al-Maliki reported Friday’s deadly Duma firebombing attack, allegedly carried out by Jewish settlers, to the International Criminal Court on Monday.

The Palestinian report addressed attacks on Palestinians by Jewish settlers in general, as well as Friday’s attack on the Dawabshe family, in which an 18-month-old toddler was killed.

PLO official Hanan Ashrawi told The Times of Israel that the document, which relied on reports by human rights groups on settler violence, represents a “new format.”

Al-Maliki also met with the ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda for over an hour, and described the meeting as the most productive to date, according to the Palestinian Ma’an news agency. Ashrawai said the meeting was scheduled after the fatal firebombing.

Jordan and the Palestinian Authority have also agreed to draft a joint appeal to the UN Security Council demanding “international protection for the Palestinian people and an end to the Israeli occupation” in response to the killing.

Saeb Erekat, the former chief Palestinian negotiator recently appointed as secretary of the PLO, discussed the matter with Jordan’s Foreign Minister Nasser Joudeh on Sunday, the Jordanian daily al-Ghad reported.

“We will turn to the Security Council requesting to place the Zionist gangs on the terror list and define them as terrorist organizations that must be confronted by the international community,” Fatah official Azzam al-Ahmad told al-Ghad, ahead of PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s trip to Cairo later this month to discuss the attack in Duma with the Arab League.

Ahmad said that the Palestinian leadership is now “seriously reconsidering” the economic and security agreements signed with Israel in the past.

Two homes in the Palestinian village of Duma, south of Nablus, were set alight, and the Hebrew words “Revenge” and “Long live the king messiah” were spray-painted on their walls, alongside a Star of David, early Friday, apparently by Jewish extremists.

The baby killed in the attack was Ali Saad Dawabsha. The infant’s parents, as well as his four-year-old brother, were all badly injured and evacuated to the hospital. The mother and the young boy are in critical condition in Israeli hospitals.

Palestinians look at the damage after a house was set on fire and a baby killed, allegedly by Jewish terrorists, in the West Bank village of Duma, on July 31, 2015. (AFP/Jaafar Ashtiyeh)

On Friday, hours after the attack, Abbas said the Palestinians would appeal to the International Criminal Court to investigate.

“We are immediately preparing the file that will be submitted to the ICC,” Abbas told reporters, while also denouncing “war crimes and crimes against humanity committed each day by Israelis against the Palestinian people.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday condemned the arson attack as a “horrific, heinous” crime that is “a terror attack in every respect.”

“I am shocked by this horrific, heinous act,” said Netanyahu in a statement. “This is a terror attack in every sense of the word. The State of Israel deals forcefully with terror, regardless of who the perpetrators are.”

The prime minister later called Abbas in a bid to quell tensions, and visited the 4-year-old victim, Ahmad Dawabsha, in the Sheba Medical Center. On Sunday, he lashed out at the Abbas and the PA, asserting that while Israel condemns its terrorists, the Palestinians “name public squares after the murderers of children.”

AFP contributed to this report.