Suspect arrested over assault on former Likud MK in East Jerusalem
Yehudah Glick calls attack on him during condolence visit to family of autistic man shot dead by police ‘a murderous lynch that ended in a miracle’
Police arrested a suspect allegedly involved in the assault Thursday of a former Likud lawmaker who was visiting the East Jerusalem family of an autistic Palestinian man shot dead by police.
The suspect, who police said Friday was a resident of East Jerusalem’s Wadi al-Joz neighborhood in his 20s, was allegedly part of a group that attacked Yehuda Glick, a longtime activist for Jewish prayer rights on the Temple Mount.
He was taken in for questioning but the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court later ordered his release to house arrest, rejecting a police request to extend his remand.
Maher Hanna, the suspect’s lawyer, said his client denied any involvement in the attack and had provided an alibi.
“The court accepted his arguments and ordered the young man’s release to house arrest,” Hanna said in a statement to Hebrew media.
Police were continuing to search for additional suspects in connection to the assault, according to Channel 12 news.
רגע תקיפתו של גליק. pic.twitter.com/xC5woWnRFk
— Suleiman Maswadeh סולימאן מסוודה (@SuleimanMas1) June 4, 2020
Glick, who was lightly injured in the assault and briefly hospitalized, released a video Friday morning thanking well-wishers.
“What I went through was a murderous lynch that ended in a miracle,” he said. “They definitely won’t stop me. I’m a very extreme person when it comes to loving people.”
Recounting the incident in a Thursday interview, Glick said he had wanted to pay his condolences to the family of Iyad Halak, 32, who was killed in Jerusalem’s Old City over the weekend.
Police said Halak appeared to be holding a gun, but he was unarmed and apparently didn’t understood officers’ orders to halt as he passed near the Lion’s Gate. He reportedly fled on foot and hid in a garbage room, where he was gunned down.
“I went in the name of people who want peace, a gesture of goodwill,” Glick told Channel 13 news. “When I entered the home and presented myself to the mourners, around 10 people suddenly grabbed me, lifted me up and threw me down a flight and a half of stairs.”
Glick said other people then began hitting and kicking him, before a relative of Halak’s tried to distance the assailants.
“I was rescued for a second time from an assassination attempt. It’s too bad people don’t understand that violence only causes damage to all of us,” Glick said after the incident.
Glick was referring to a 2014 assassination attempt in which he was seriously wounded. He has said the attacker called him the “enemy of Al-Aqsa” before shooting him as he left an event at the Begin Center in Jerusalem promoting Jewish visiting and prayer rights to the Temple Mount.
The man who helped Glick get away accused him of seeking to create a “provocation” by going to the Halak family home in the Wadi al-Joz neighborhood, which is in the shadow of the Temple Mount.
“I rescued him from there. They don’t like him here,” the man, identified only as Sami, told Channel 13.
Glick served as a Knesset member for the Likud party from 2016-2019.
