Prosecutors in Israel have indicted an extremist settler for shooting a Palestinian activist last July, the first attempt this decade to hold an Israeli responsible for killing a Palestinian in the occupied West Bank.
Yinon Levy, who was under western sanctions, is charged with manslaughter over the death of Awdeh Hathaleen, an English teacher and peace activist. In his last moments, Hathaleen filmed the settler drawing his weapon and opening fire towards him.
Hathaleen’s family said Levy should have been charged with first-degree murder over the well-documented attack in the village of Umm al-Khair.
Reckless manslaughter carries a maximum prison sentence of 12 years, far less then murder.
“This was not an accident,” said his cousin Tarek Hathaleen. “Yinon Levy must be held fully accountable for Awdeh’s killing.”
The charges nevertheless represented a “significant development”, Hathaleen added, after years of near-total impunity for Israelis who attack Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
Israeli settlers and soldiers have killed more than 1,500 Palestinians this decade, according to rights group B’tselem. Levy is the first person indicted over any of those deaths.
Military prosecutors last brought charges over a 2019 shooting of a young man who stopped to help victims of a traffic accidentThe last time civilian prosecutors brought charges was in 2018 over the killing of a mother of eight, hit by a rock as she was driving.
Settler violence and ethnic cleansing has surged in the occupied West Bank over the past three years, supported by far-right Israeli cabinet ministers who hold security, defence and finance portfolios.
Levy’s indictment over one of the highest-profile killings in that period does not represent a policy shift for Israel, rights groups said.
Hathaleen had worked on No Other Land, the Oscar-winning documentary about his community’s decades-long struggle against the Israeli state and settlers, to stay in their homes and lands in the south Hebron hills.
“It’s important to see this killing as part of an ongoing and systematic situation in the West Bank,” said Ziv Stahl, executive director of Yesh Din, an Israeli rights and advocacy organisation.
“I don’t think these charges are an indication of increased law enforcement or accountability. It is more likely due to the fact that [Awdeh Hathaleen] was a well-known activist and the case got a lot of media exposure and public critique. It’s more about an appearance of law enforcement, rather than actual law enforcement.”
Levy, who was under sanctions for violence against Palestinians by the UK, EU, Canada and Australia at the time of the attack, was briefly detained last year but police released him after three days under house arrest.
He spent the last year free and continued establishing illegal outposts in the occupied West Bank, said Yair Dvir, spokesperson for B’tselem.
“The decision to indict Yinon Levy is the exception that proves the rule,” Dvir said. “The impunity Israel grants to soldiers and settlers who harm Palestinians is not a failure of the system – it is a central component of a policy designed to allow the violence to continue and escalate.”
The culture of impunity spurred the former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert to call for the International Criminal Court to bring charges against “Jewish terrorists”, saying intervention was needed to halt the violence.
Levy is also charged with armed trespassing and malicious property damage in the Palestinian village of Umm al-Khair.
Before Hathaleen was shot, another settler drove a bulldozer through Palestinian land, destroying trees and property. When a resident approached and asked him to stop, the driver knocked the man down with the bulldozer blade.
Even if the case goes to trial, any verdict could be many years away, and Israeli judges have a record of lenient treatment of Israelis who attack Palestinians.
The Israeli soldier who shot 23-year-old Ahmad Manasrah dead in 2019 pleaded guilty to the equivalent of negligent homicide and was sentenced to three months community service for the killing. He has not been publicly named.
Eight years after a 2018 attack that killed 47 year-old Aisha Rabi, an Israeli court ruled that a settler had thrown the stone that killed her.
Judges did not hand down a conviction or sentence, instead ordering a review because the man, who was not named, was 16 at the time of the attack. No further details have been made public.
Hathaleen’s family say they will continue to fight for Levy to face full trial. “Justice requires more than simply bringing a charge,” said Tarek Hathaleen. “Awdeh was not only my cousin. He was my childhood friend and someone very dear to me. His absence has left a pain that will never go away.”
Sufian Taha contributed reporting
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