US condemns terrorist attack that killed Palestinian toddler

The world woke on Friday, July 31, to the news of a bad crime in which an 18-month-old Palestinian was burnt to death and members of his family severely injured after masked Jewish settlers set fire to two Palestinian houses in Duma village.

A Palestinian’s home was burned during a “price tag” attack Friday that killed a toddler and critically injured at least three other relatives, Israeli and Palestinian officials said.

Outside of Dawabsha’s home, the arsonists spray painted a star of David and “revenge” in Hebrew, signifying the killing was a “price tag” attack, in which Israeli settlers seek retaliation for government demolitions of settlements by committing acts of violence against Palestinians.

His 4-year-old brother, Ahmad, and his parents, Saad and Riham, remain in critical condition and are being treated in the burn unit of an Israeli hospital.

According to B’Tselem statistics, in the past three years since August 2012, Israeli civilians set fire to nine Palestinian homes in the West Bank.

Israel tore down two illegal structures in the Beit El settlement earlier this week.

Israeli police said they would restrict entrance to Friday prayers at a Jerusalem mosque to male worshippers over the age of 50. “I don’t know what those people were thinking”. In addition to expressing his shame over those who “have lost their humanity”, President Reuven Rivlin acknowledged that “to my great sorrow, until now it seems we have been lax in our treatment of the phenomena of Jewish terrorism”.

“Extreme-right Israeli activists have committed acts of vandalism and violence against Palestinians and Arab Israelis for years, attacking Christian and Muslim places of worship and even Israeli soldiers”, reports Agence France-Presse.

Israeli authorities mobilised a large deployment in Jerusalem’s Old City around the flashpoint Al-Aqsa mosque and barred men under 50 years old from entering the complex.

Somewhat predictably, the Palestinian Authority exaggerated the situation as though such deadly acts of arson were a regular occurrence, and threatened to drag Israel before the global Criminal Court.

Hamas leader Hussam Badran said his movement holds the Israeli government responsible for the killing of the Palestinian toddler.

Another Palestinian official, Saeb Erekat, said Israel was to blame for the incident.

“All indications are that the perpetrators of this violence are Jews, engaged in the kind of “price tag” attacks that have become all too frequent”, Rabbi Jonah Pesner, the director of Reform’s Religious Action Center, said in a statement.

Friday’s incident came after Israel this week demolished homes in a West Bank settlement built without prior authorization.

The Palestinian leadership was outraged, holding the Israeli government accountable.

The second house was empty at the time of the attack.

In a statement, Netanyahu said he had called Abbas and told him: “We must fight terrorism together regardless of which side it comes from”. AP will not be held liable for any delays, inaccuracies, errors or omissions therefrom or in the transmission or delivery of all or any part thereof or for any damages arising from any of the foregoing.