Israeli ministers urge death penalty for Palestinian killer of teenage Jewish girl

Two Israeli ministers called for the death penalty in the killing of 19-year-old Ori Ansbacher.

By David Isaac, World Israel News

On Sunday, Likud minister Gilad Erdan argued that Arafat Irfayia, the terrorist who admitted killing of 19-year-old Israeli Ori Ansbacher, should receive the death penalty given the shocking nature of the death.

Ansbacher, 19, from the town of Tekoa in Judea, five miles south of Bethelem. She was walking in the woods in the Ein Yael nature center when Irfayia spotted her and attacked her, according to his own confession said the Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service, in a statement released Saturday night.

“The possibility of a death penalty is already on the books,” Gilad Erdan, who serves as public security and strategic affairs minister said in an interview with Israeli news outlet Kan Bet. “If a case where the murderer abused his victim and if we understand that there is no way to rehabilitate him – and in cases like the murder of the Fogel family – the death penalty must be applied.”

Erdan referred to the Fogel family murder – in which five members of the same family, including three children – were murdered in 2011 by two Palestinian cousins from the village of Awarta. The youngest victim, Hadas, a three-month-old baby, was decapitated. The two murderers were not sentenced to death but to five life sentences.

Erdan also said that the attack was clearly a terror attack, and not merely a criminal one.

Irfayia had left his home in Hebron with a knife in order to carry out an attack, according to the Shin Bet. He had previously been arrested for carrying a knife and for being in Israel illegally. Kan Bet reports that his family identifies with the terror group Hamas.

Erdan echoed the words of Justice Minister and New Right party co-founder Ayelet Shaked, who said in an interview with Israel’s Channel 13 on Saturday that she supports the death penalty for the killer. “I think the military prosecution should ask him to be sentenced to death,” she said.

Shaked also said that the motives of Irfayia were nationalistic. “We should not hide behind the truth, he killed Ori because she is a Jewish girl, and we should not obscure the truth.”

She also said that Prime Minister Netanyahu should prevent the transfer of a salary to a murderer, referring to Palestinian Authority’s official policy to reward terrorists who carry out attacks against Jews. “It is inconceivable that now that poor murderer will receive a monthly salary from Abu Mazen,” added the justice minister.