Killing of Yehuda Shoham

Last updated

Killing of Yehuda Shoham
Part of the Second Intifada
Israel outline binyamin.png
Red pog.svg
class=notpageimage|
The location of Eli, West Bank
Location Eli, West Bank
Date5 June 2001;22 years ago (2001-06-05)
Attack type
Stoning attack
WeaponsLarge rock
DeathsYehuda Shoham
PerpetratorsUnknown

The killing of Yehuda Shoham occurred on 5 June 2001 as the result of a stoning attack attributed to Palestinians on a civilian vehicle, from the Israeli settlement of Shilo, in which five-month-old American-Israeli Yehuda Shoham was seated. Rocks crashed through the car's windscreen and crushed the infant's skull. Shoham died of severe brain damage on 11 June 2001. [1] [2]

Contents

This stoning attack and the infant's death, six days later, made headlines in Israel. [3] [4] [5] Both incidents were part of a Second Intifada that started in September, 2000 and by 12 June 2001 had claimed the lives of 489 Palestinians and 109 Israelis. [6]

Attack

The incident occurred as Benny and Batsheva Shoham and their only child Yehuda approached Eli after paying a shiva call in Ra'anana. [4]

Near Eli, Palestinians hiding at the roadside hurled rocks at the car which broke through the car's windscreen and crushed the infant's skull. [4] The father continued driving, worried about an ambush, and at a nearby intersection, the couple noticed their baby's head injuries. [5] Batsheva performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on Yehuda until the arrival of paramedics. [4]

Yehuda was taken to an intensive care unit at the Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, where he lay unconscious and with severe head injuries. He was attached to a respirator for nearly a week before dying of severe brain damage on 11 July. [1] [4] [5] [7] [8]

During his time in the hospital, Yehuda's parents gave him a second name, "Chaim," which means life, hoping that he would live. [9] While in the hospital, Yehuda was visited by then Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. [10]

Background

The Second Intifada, which began 8 months earlier, marked a period of intensified Palestinian-Israeli violence. On 22 May, Sharon declared a unilateral ceasefire and refrained from retaliating against Palestinian attacks. On Friday, 1 June, a suicide bombing outside a Tel Aviv disco occurred which killed 21 people, mainly Israeli teenagers who had immigrated from Russia. [11] The day after, Saturday, June 2, Yasser Arafat's call for a cease-fire staved off Israeli retaliation. [12]

Aftermath

In the meantime, Israel took a variety of measures to reduce tension, with Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer citing a "significant reduction in the number of attacks". Though Palestinians would be subject to strict closure confining them to their towns, Israel eased some travel restrictions and Palestinians were to be allowed to return from Jordan and Egypt, raw materials would be permitted to enter and exit the Palestinian territories, and Palestinians would be allowed to return to their jobs in an industrial zone near the Erez crossing point. Palestinian security commanders traveled to trouble spots in the Gaza Strip to consult with local officers over the cease-fire enforcement. [12]

When news of Yehuda's wounding spread on Tuesday, 5 June, far-right settlers urged Ariel Sharon to retaliate. [13] The incident angered Israel's 200,000 settlers who urged Ariel Sharon to end Israel's "policy of restraint", and abandon the ceasefire. The Independent suggested that the incident would be cited by many Israelis as reason for stepping up military measures. [5] The morning after Yehuda's wounding, at least 300 settlers, arriving in buses, assailed two villages adjacent to Shiloh, Assawiya, [14] and Luban al-Sharkiya, which lay under curfew and within Israel's security responsibility, and, according to B'tselem, in the presence of, and according to local testimony, with the assistance of the IDF, fired a wheat harvest, a hothouse, a carpentry shop and a school, stole tools and shot a Palestinian youth in the stomach [15] or the leg. [13]

There were rock-throwing battles between settlers and Palestinians at the site of the attack on the Shohams' car during which one Israeli and seven Palestinians were injured. [16] [17] In addition, settlers in Hebron also attacked local Palestinian shopkeepers. The settlers had been a focal target of Palestinian militancy during an eight-month uprising. [18] Two settlers were arrested by Israeli police as a result of the riots. [6]

Though reluctant to become involved in the conflict, the U.S. dispatched C.I.A. director George Tenet, who was scheduled to meet separately with the Israeli and Palestinian sides on Thursday, June 7, in order to re-establish co-operation on security issues between the two parties, which had broken down after the IDF had shot at the car of the Gaza Strip security chief Mohammad Dahlan in mid-April, and had fired on the home of their West Bank security chief Jibril Rajoub in late May. [13]

Tenet's visit backed up an effort by the European Union to seize on Arafat's declaration in order to transform the ceasefire into a genuine halt to the reciprocal blood-letting. [13] On Wednesday, 6 June, the eve of Tenet's scheduled visit, the IDF announced it would award medals to the commanders and troops serving at Netzarim Junction, where the child, Mohammed al-Dura had been shot dead. The news was seen as a blow to the restoration of trust. Thousands of demonstrators protested in Jerusalem against what they termed Sharon's "restraint policy". [13] That same evening, Palestinians were outraged when Sharon called Arafat a "murderer" and "pathological liar" in an interview addressing the Russian community that had been angered at his failure to retaliate for the disco bombing. The broadcast was carried on Israeli television. Though given the red-carpet treatment abroad, he added, Arafat did not act like a head of state but rather like the chief of terrorists and murderers. [12]

On Thursday, 7 June, speaking to reporters at a rally urging Ariel Sharon to retaliate for the attack on Yehuda and other recent attacks, Yehuda's father said "Unfortunately, our government is showing a lot of weakness in its response to terrorism". [19] He also declared:

This is our land, these are our roads, and if we are afraid of driving to Tel Aviv [ Tel Aviv ] and Netanya [ Netanya ] also. [4]

Negotiations, funeral and reactions

Tenet's meeting with both sides was postponed until Sunday, June 10, after the Americans realized the extent of their differences. Matters were buffeted by the killing of three Bedouin women, struck by Israeli tank shells while in their tents in the Gaza Strip over the weekend, and the critical injuries sustained by an Islamic Jihad member in a car-bombing, which the group suspected as being the work of Israel. [5] [20] He proposed that Israel desist from attacking Palestinian targets and withdraw to the positions they held on 28 September 2000. He asked Palestinians to thwart attacks on Israeli positions, to end what Israelis view as incitement in the media, and to proceed to arrest militant gunmen. [20]

On Monday, 11 June, the day Yehuda died, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres met the Palestinian minister for international co-operation, Nabil Shaath in Luxembourg to explore a compromise. Tenet eventually presided over a tense 4-hour meeting the following day, which was broken off after the gaps failed to be bridged. The Israelis insisted on the arrest of people they suspected of terrorism before they would allow a cooling-off period, while the Palestinians demanded that security arrangements be followed by an Israeli pledge to freeze to all construction in settlements in the occupied territories. [21] The Palestinians refused to conduct what they called arbitrary arrests. The chief of staff of the Israeli army, General Shaul Mofaz, called the truce itself an optical illusion. [20]

The funeral procession for Yehuda began with settlers gathering in front of Ariel Sharon's office in Jerusalem [11] with the child's body carried before them. [22] As Sharon stepped up to a podium to address them, settlers shouted "Vengeance!" and "Go to war". [6] Prime Minister Sharon spoke to the funeral procession outside his office, [11] and, acknowledging the settlers' impatience with a ceasefire, [6] said:

If we stand firm and grit our teeth, and carry on even when the tears are choking us, we will win... [11] I am not here to make a speech, but to weep, to weep together with you. May the memory of Yehuda be blessed.[ citation needed ]

Sharon also asked for prayers for the infant, and accused the Palestinian Authority of inciting violence. [21] From there the procession walked to the northern West Bank settlement of Shilo where Yehuda was buried. One of Yehuda's cousins said, "Yehuda was just a baby, without sin or enemy, yet he was killed for one reason only, he was a Jew on his way home in Eretz Yisrael [ Eretz Yisrael ]." [23] In a letter to the United Nations, Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations Yehuda Lancry outlined Israel's position, which affirmed that the death of Yehuda Shoham constituted a "reprehensible act of terrorism" that took place just over two weeks after Israel had declared that it would refrain from initiating military action against Palestinians, and barely a week after Yassir Arafat had undertaken to fight violence and terrorism. [24]

In Yehuda's memory, his parents decided to collect donations for dormitories at the yeshiva in Shiloh.[ citation needed ] His parents also established the Yehuda Fund in January 2002 "in their son's memory." [25]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Israeli–Palestinian conflict</span> Ongoing military and political conflict in the Levant

The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is one of the world's most enduring conflicts, beginning in the mid-20th century. Various attempts have been made to resolve the conflict as part of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, alongside other efforts to resolve the broader Arab–Israeli conflict. Public declarations of claims to a Jewish homeland in Palestine, including the First Zionist Congress of 1897 and the Balfour Declaration of 1917, created early tensions in the region after waves of Jewish immigration. Following World War I, the Mandate for Palestine included a binding obligation for the "establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people". Tensions grew into open sectarian conflict between Jews and Arabs. The 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was never implemented and provoked the 1947–1949 Palestine War. The current Israeli-Palestinian status quo began following Israeli military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 Six-Day War, known as the Palestinian territories.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Second Intifada</span> 2000–2005 Palestinian uprising against Israel

The Second Intifada, also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada, was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. The general triggers for the unrest are speculated to have been centred on the failure of the 2000 Camp David Summit, which was expected to reach a final agreement on the Israeli–Palestinian peace process in July 2000. Outbreaks of violence began in September 2000, after Ariel Sharon, then the Israeli opposition leader, made a provocative visit to the Al-Aqsa compound on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem; the visit itself was peaceful, but, as anticipated, sparked protests and riots that Israeli police put down with rubber bullets and tear gas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Road map for peace</span> Proposal for a two-state solution in the Israeli−Palestinian peace process

The Roadmap for peace or road map for peace was a plan to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict proposed by the Quartet on the Middle East: the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations. The principles of the plan, originally drafted by U.S. Foreign Service Officer Donald Blome, were first outlined by U.S. President George W. Bush in a speech on 24 June 2002, in which he called for an independent Palestinian state living side by side with Israel in peace. A draft version from the Bush administration was published as early as 14 November 2002. The final text was released on 30 April 2003. The process reached a deadlock early in phase I and the plan was never implemented.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Palestinian political violence</span> Violence with political ends in the State of Palestine

Palestinian political violence refers to acts of violence perpetrated for political ends in relation to the State of Palestine or in connection with Palestinian nationalism. Common political objectives include self-determination in and sovereignty over Palestine, or the "liberation of Palestine" and recognition of a Palestinian state, either in place of both Israel and the Palestinian territories, or solely in the Palestinian territories. More limited goals include the release of Palestinian prisoners or the Palestinian right of return. Other motivations include personal grievances, trauma or revenge.

Prime ministerial elections were held in Israel on 6 February 2001 following the resignation of the incumbent Prime Minister Ehud Barak on 9 December 2000. Barak stood for re-election against Likud's Ariel Sharon.

The murder of Shalhevet Pass was a shooting attack carried out in Hebron, West Bank, on 26 March 2001, in which a Palestinian sniper killed 10-month-old Israeli infant Shalhevet Pass. The event shocked the Israeli public, partly because an investigation ruled that the sniper had deliberately aimed for the baby. According to Deborah Sontag of the New York Times, the murder became a "potent Israeli symbol as an innocent victim of the raging violence."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Itamar</span> Israeli settlement in the West Bank

Itamar is an Israeli settlement located in the West Bank's Samarian mountains, five kilometers southeast of the Palestinian city of Nablus. The settlement was built on land confiscated from the Palestinian villages of Awarta, Beit Furik,Yanun, Aqraba and Rujeib. The predominantly Orthodox Jewish community falls in part within the municipal jurisdiction of the Shomron Regional Council. Under the terms of the Oslo Accords of 1993 between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, Itamar was designated Area "C", under provisional Israeli civil and security control, before a transition period after which Area "C" was to be handed back to the Palestinians. In 2021, it had a population of 1,354.

Note: This compilation includes only those attacks on Israelis that resulted in casualties and no Palestinian deaths are recorded. Numerous other attacks which failed to kill, maim, or wound are not included.

The following is a partial list of civilian casualties in the Second Intifada. According to the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism, 887 of the 1,137 Israelis killed in attacks from September 2000 – 2005 were civilians. Another 8,341 Israelis were wounded during this period, including 5,676 civilians and 2,665 security forces personnel. The majority of casualties were caused by suicide bombings, though Israelis have also been killed by planted bombs, shootings, stonings, stabbings, lynchings, rockets, and other methods of attack.

Events in the year 2001 in Israel.

The murders of Koby Mandell and Yosef Ishran occurred on 8 May 2001, when two Jewish teenagers, Yaakov "Koby" Mandell and Yosef Ishran, were killed on the outskirts of the Israeli settlement of Tekoa in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where they lived with their families. The identity of the killers has never been determined, though Israel and a number of sources state that unidentified Palestinian terrorists were responsible.

Events in the year 2001 in the Palestinian territories.

Events in the year 2000 in the Palestinian territories.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Davidka Square bus bombing</span> 2003 suicide bombing in Jerusalem, Israel

A suicide bombing took place on June 11, 2003, on Egged bus line 14a at Davidka Square in the center of Jerusalem. 17 people were killed in the attack and over 100 people were injured.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Israeli settler violence</span> Violence by Israeli settlers in the West Bank

Israeli settler violence refers to acts of violence committed by Jewish Israeli settlers and their supporters against Palestinians and Israeli security forces, predominantly in the West Bank. In November 2021, Defense Minister Benny Gantz discussed the steep rise in the number of incidents between settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank, many of which result from attacks by residents of illegal settler outposts on Palestinians from neighboring villages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2015–2016 wave of violence in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict</span> Notable increase of violence in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict

An increase of violence occurred in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict starting in the autumn of 2015 and lasting into the first half of 2016. It was called the "Intifada of the Individuals" by Israeli sources, the "Knife Intifada", "Stabbing Intifada" or "Jerusalem Intifada" by international sources because of the many stabbings in Jerusalem, or "Habba" by Palestinian sources.

Father Germanos, born Georgios Tsibouktzakis, was a Greek Orthodox monk-priest and abbot of St. George's Monastery, Wadi Qelt who was murdered by a terrorist on 12 June 2001 in a drive-by shooting. Yassir Arafat had declared a unilateral ceasefire a week before this attack, following the Dolphinarium discotheque massacre; both the Dolphinarium attack and this shooting were part of the Second Intifada, which began in 2000.

References

  1. 1 2 "Yehuda Shoham // In Memory of the Victims of Palestinian Violence and Terrorism in Israel". mfa.gov.il . Retrieved 7 August 2012.
  2. ↑ "The Deadly Reality of Palestinian Rock Throwing". Israel Defense Forces. 24 February 2014. Retrieved 20 September 2015.
  3. ↑ "Caught in the cross fire". The Washington Times . Associated Press. 11 September 2002. Retrieved 9 August 2012.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Lefkovits, Etgar (7 June 2001). "'It's as if we've been abandoned'". The Jerusalem Post . Retrieved 7 August 2012.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Reeves, Phil (12 June 2001). "Settlers' baby dies after Palestinian stoning". The Independent. Archived from the original on 3 January 2013. Retrieved 7 August 2012.
  6. 1 2 3 4 Sevareid, Susan (7 June 2001). "Injury to baby triggers rampage by Israeli settlers". The Seattle Times . Reuters contributed to this report. p. A10.
  7. ↑ Halle, Charlotte. "Disproportionate number of Anglos slain; Olmert praises families' dignity". Haaretz . Retrieved 7 August 2012.
  8. ↑ Singer, David; Grossman, Lawrence (2003). American Jewish Year, Book 2002. VNR AG. p. 561. ISBN   0874951178.
  9. ↑ "'Arafat must be defeated,' protesters say. Three Israelis wounded in shooting near Ramallah; Shilo baby fights to survive after stoning". The Jerusalem Post. 7 June 2001.
  10. ↑ Philips, Alan (12 June 2001). "Israeli settlers mourn baby killed in stoning". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  11. 1 2 3 4 "Settlers blame Sharon for baby's death". Hobart Mercury. 13 June 2001. p. 14.
  12. 1 2 3 Mark Lavie, "U.S. sending CIA director for security talks", Lubbock Avalanche-Journal , 6 June 2001.
  13. 1 2 3 4 5 "Settler rampage makes CIA chief's peace mission harder". The Scotsman. 7 June 2001. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  14. ↑ Nomi Morris (7 June 2001). "Settlers attack Palestinian village - Injury to baby triggers fury". Milwaukee Journal Sentinel . Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  15. ↑ Ron Dudai,"Free Rein: Vigilante Settlers and Israel's Non-Enforcement of the Law", B'tselem, October 2001, pp 9-11:'Israeli security forces were present throughout the events but did not prevent the violence. In fact, they prevented Palestinians from defending themselves, and even joined the settlers in their violence. Testimonies given to B'Tselem indicate that the soldiers also prohibited fire engines and ambulances from reaching the scene.'
  16. ↑ "Sharon attack blows away uneasy calm". The Birmingham Post. 7 June 2001.
  17. ↑ Jayson Keyser (6 June 2001). "Sharon supporters warn they're tired of Israeli restraint". Associated Press Archive. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  18. ↑ Nomi Morris (7 June 2001). "Settlers attack Palestinian village - Injury to baby triggers fury". Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  19. ↑ "Israelis urge Sharon to End Restraint Plan". Press of Atlantic City. 7 June 2001. p. A3.
  20. 1 2 3 Mid-East ceasefire talks break up, BBC News 11 Monday 2001.
  21. 1 2 Frantz, Douglas (12 June 2001). "Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations Break Off After 4 Hours". The New York Times. Retrieved 10 August 2012.
  22. ↑ "Jewish settlers in West Bank urge revenge for dead baby". Chicago Sun-Times . 12 June 2001. p. 25. Archived from the original on 11 October 2014.
  23. ↑ Harow, Ari (14 June 2001). "My Cousin Yehuda". Aish. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  24. ↑ "Letter dated 11 June 2001 from the Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary-General" (PDF). UN. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
  25. ↑ "Yehuda Fund". Yehuda Fund. Retrieved 7 August 2012.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.