Netanyahu at site of attack: 'They want to destroy, we want to build'

Netanyahu said that he had no doubt that the murderers would be apprehended.

By HERB KEINON
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a visit of an army base in the West Bank settlement of Beit El near Ramallah January 10, 2017 (photo credit: BAZ RATNER/REUTERS)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a visit of an army base in the West Bank settlement of Beit El near Ramallah January 10, 2017
(photo credit: BAZ RATNER/REUTERS)
The terrorists are coming to destroy, “and we are coming to build,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday afternoon in Gush Etzion at the site of the murder of 19-year-old Dvir Sorek.
“We lost a dear son of the Sorek family,” Netanyahu said. “We embrace the family. Our answer to these murderers is twofold: First of all, they are coming to destroy, and we are coming to build.”
Secondly, he said, “we will apprehend them and bring them to justice.”
Netanyahu, who came to the site after holding security consultations in the Kirya in Tel Aviv, said that the investigation is ongoing, and that the turn the car did after the murder was evident at the site.
The prime minister stressed that in recent years the security apparatus has found all the terrorist murderers. “And I have no doubt, also based on what I have heard, that we will get to who committed this horrible murder, and bring them – and those who sent them – to justice.”
Meanwhile, UN Mideast envoy Nickolay Mladenov condemned the murder, calling it in a tweet a “cowardly, dangerous act” that “serves those who want escalation,”
Violence and terrorism must be condemned, he wrote, saying they undermine trust between Israelis and Palestinians and “destroy the chances of peace.”
The EU’s ambassador in Israel Emanuele Giaufret also addressed the attack on Twitter, sending “deepest condolences” to the Sorek family, and adding, “No justification for violence.”
While neither diplomat made any reference to alleged Hamas or Palestinian responsibility for the attack, US Mideast mediator Jason Greenblatt, in tweeting his condolences to the family, had no such qualms, posting a link to a Jerusalem Post article reporting that Hamas congratulated the murderer.
“More murder & boasting by Hamas – reprehensible actions by an org[anization] that chooses death & destruction over taking care of the people they claim to lead,” he tweeted.