The arson also touched on Palestinian fears of extremist Jewish settlers, who have attacked Palestinian property with impunity. A second suspect, whose name was withheld as a 17-year-old minor, was charged with aiding murder, Israeli police spokeswoman Luba Samri said.
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PM Benjamin Netanyahu has censured the assault which slaughtered the Dawabshehs as terrorism, however Israeli authorities have been condemned for neglecting to charge anybody in connection to the case.
Israel has authorised a series of steps, including administrative detention, to try and crack the case. “We are not restricting it to one sector and we are not focusing on only one sector”, Netanyahu told his Cabinet on Sunday.
But critics have said that similar, albeit not deadly, attacks have festered for years with little action by the government.
Moshe Yaalon, the Israeli Defense Minister, stated on November 5th that retaining these bodies did not provide any deterrent effect against future attacks, and recommended that the process be ended.
Amiram Ben-Oliel, described by Israeli media as a 21-year-old Jewish radical from Jerusalem, was charged with racially-motivated murder at Lod court near Tel Aviv. It said the arson was in retaliation for the killing of an Israeli by Palestinians a month earlier.
A Palestinian man looks out a house that was badly damaged from a suspected attack by Jewish extremists on two houses at Kafr Duma village near the West Bank city of Nablus, in this July 31, 2015 file picture.
The two Israelis are charged with being part of a terror organization. “Catch the rest of them”, said Hussein Dawabshe, the toddler’s grandfather.
The minor was also accused of having taken part in an arson attack on the Dormition Abbey in east Jerusalem. “It’s a lead. They now need to follow the lead all the way through”.
Since November, almost two dozen members of The Revolt have been arrested by Shin Bet.
“I doubt such confessions will stand up in court”, their lawyer Hai Haber said. Shin Bet said recent crackdowns haven’t fully eradicated the group’s leadership.
Police said in a statement it had made the investigation and tracking down the attackers a top “national” priority.
The Yesha council, an umbrella group of West Bank settlements, commended the indictment and said the suspects do not represent it.
The Palestinian Authority has pledged to carry out autopsies on each of the bodies returned by Israeli authorities, but it is unclear how that will be carried out.
A Palestinian was prevented from stabbing an Israeli in Jerusalem on Sunday when his knife bent during the attack, the Hebrew news website Walla reported. Referred to in Israel as “price-tag attacks”, such offences have usually been carried out in what the attackers say are reprisals for Palestinian violence against Israelis or government curbs on unauthorised building in the West Bank.
Palestinians cite the Duma incident as a factor in the three-month wave of attacks and clashes affectling the region, saying they are frustrated by years of unchecked settler violence.
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The Revolt took shape in October 2013, Israeli security forces said, when its founders laid out their guiding principles. The Palestinians say it is rooted in frustration stemming from almost five decades of Israeli occupation.
