Israel jails five relatives of Palestinian who killed three settlers

AFP , Monday 28 Aug 2017

The family home
The family home of Palestinian Omar al-Abed in the West Bank village of Kobar destroyed by the Israeli army on August 16 after he stabbed to death three residents of the Halamish Jewish settlement (Photo: AFP)

Israel has jailed five relatives of a Palestinian who stabbed three settlers to death claiming they knew about his plan and did not try to stop him, the army said Monday.

A military court ruled Sunday that the father, mother, uncle and two brothers of Omar al-Abed "knew he intended to commit an attack and did nothing to warn the security services to prevent it".

Abed's brothers and uncle were sentenced to eight months in prison, while his father and mother received two and one months respectively, according to court documents seen Monday by AFP.

The mother was also found guilty of inciting violence after defending his actions in Palestinian media, a military source said.

On August 16 the Israeli occupation army destroyed the family home in the village of Kobar near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.

Omar al-Abed sneaked into the West Bank Israeli settlement of Halamish on July 21 and stabbed four members of the same family, killing three.

Abed was shot during the attack and later arrested.

The attack came with tensions high over the sensitive Al-Aqsa mosque compound in occupied east Jerusalem.

The Israeli army said he had spoken of defending Al-Aqsa and of dying as a martyr in a Facebook post prior to the attack.

*Edited by Ahram Online.

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