Israeli President pardons combat medic who shot dead a badly wounded Palestinian attacker
&imwidth=600&imheight=450&format=webp&quality=medium "Israeli President pardons combat medic who shot dead a badly wounded Palestinian attacker")
Israeli soldier Elor Azaria Photograph: (AFP)
After his release, Elor Azaria in an interview said he would “act exactly the same, because that’s how I needed to act”.
The combat medic who shot dead at close range a badly wounded Palestinian attacker who had stabbed a soldier in the occupied West Bank about a decade ago, was pardoned by Israeli president on Saturday (Sept 19).
Elor Azaria’s conviction in 2017 for manslaughter and his release after serving two-thirds of his 18-month sentence was amongst the most talked about cases in the country. It is compulsory for most Jewish men to serve in the military.
After his release, Azaria in an interview said he would “act exactly the same, because that’s how I needed to act”, reported Associated Press.
Abdel Fattah al-Sharif, the Palestinian attacker lay on the ground, unarmed and badly hurt, after stabbing a soldier in the city of Hebron, when Azaria approached him and shot him in the head. A mobile phone video captured the incident.
President Isaac Herzog said in a statement released on Saturday said that he acted on the recommendation of defence minister Israel Katz. He cited the time of the case, the spirit of the approaching Yom Kippur, or Day of Atonement and holiday among the factors behind his pardon.
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Herzog’s office also said that Azaria, who was 20 when he was sentenced, had “expressed his sorrow” after the incident. He also acknowledged that his gunshot was an “operational error”.
A similar sentiment was echoed by Israel’s hard-line national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir who in a statement on Saturday said, “cancelling the criminal record of someone who killed a terrorist makes me emotional and very happy”.
Notably, military chief of staff, Lt Gen Eyal Zamir, had said in a letter to the defence minister that the pardon should not be granted, according to the Israeli media.
Azaria’s sentence was described by some Palestinians and human rights groups as far too lenient. Prosecutors had sought a sentence of three to five years.
