Explaining expected light sentence for soldier who shot Palestinian
The Jerusalem Post has learned a significant number of new details which place the plea bargain in a new light.
By YONAH JEREMY BOBPalestinians carry the body of Ahmad Jamal Manasra during his funeral ceremony in the West Bank village of Wad Fokin, near Bethlehem on March 21, 2019(photo credit: WISAM HASHLAMOUN/FLASH90)
On Sunday, there were leaked reports that the IDF soldier who shot and killed an innocent Palestinian on March 20, 2019 at a junction near Efrat will get a lenient plea bargain carrying only three months of community service.The bizarre result and incomplete explanation that the IDF Spokesman’s office gave on the record raised a range of questions.But The Jerusalem Post has learned a significant number of new details which place the plea bargain in a new light.Ahmad Manasra, the 23-year-old killed Palestinian, was helping another Palestinian, Ala Iaada, who had been shot by the same soldier and seriously wounded.The soldier who killed Manasra was charged with negligent homicide.But he was not charged for his original shooting and wounding of Iaada, though that first shooting is mentioned in the indictment.Essentially, the IDF official statement said that Iaada was waving his hands at another driver who had collided with him, but then improperly left the scene.Though Iaada obviously violated no laws simply by waving his hands at another driver improperly fleeing a collision scene, the IDF soldier believed that he was throwing rocks at passing vehicles.The IDF legal division found that, though mistaken, this was a reasonable estimate.Next, it followed that framing the incident as being about shooting to wound and arrest a dangerous rock thrower (as opposed to a rock thrower who is too far away to harm civilian drivers) was the basis for not charging the soldier for shooting Iaada.
Also, Iaada survived.But none of this explains why the IDF soldier would get such a lenient charge and plea bargain with no jail time once he shot Manasra.Even according to the soldier’s narrative, Manasra was not waiving his arms or endangering anyone.The only way that the soldier justified his shooting of Manasra was that he believed Manasra was the same man as the original man he had shot who had previously been throwing rocks.If Manasra had been the same man who was throwing rocks, then the soldier made a massive mistake of fact which changes the entire way a court would analyze his conduct.This bizarre explanation exposes the soldier and the IDF to the questions: Is this story so preposterous that it is more likely a sloppy cover-up story? Even if the soldier made such a genuine mistake, if his view of the scene was poor enough to make such a basic mistake of identity, then maybe the soldier’s decision to shoot becomes too unreasonable under the circumstances to avoid a manslaughter charge?The Post has learned that the soldier was a new immigrant with a background from a country which left him unprepared for the incident, which itself lasted a matter of seconds.At the time of the incident, the soldier was alone at his post and it was the first time he had ever used live fire or been confronted with a potential operational situation, the Post has learned.Further, the IDF Spokesman’s Office said that there had been warnings that same day of a heightened possibility of attacks.In addition, the Post has learned that the soldier’s perspective was likely impacted by the general time period in which there was a spike of nearby terror attacks, including against a fellow soldier and against well-known Rabbi Achiad Ettinger in the three days before.Finally, the Post has learned that – immediately after shooting Manasra and before he had any time to inspect the scene or carefully think through the incident – the soldier reported the incident as his having shot one rock thrower.In contrast, when “Hebron Shooter” Elor Azaria was convicted of manslaughter of a Palestinian, a major factor was that in real-time he admitted fault, and only concocted an explanation which might justify his actions later.The fact that the soldier in this case kept a coherent story from the time of his spontaneous response to his later response led the IDF legal division to conclude that he had no malicious intent, and truly made a mistake.Once one accepts the soldier’s story as genuine, however unreasonable, the most serious charge that one can bring is negligent homicide, as opposed to manslaughter.Even at this point, the soldier could have been given jail time.Border policeman Ben Deri was convicted of negligent homicide and was still sentenced to nine months in jail.The Post has learned that the IDF legal division view was that there was evidence against Ben Deri of malicious intent and that this led to a severe punishment (relative to a negligent homicide charge.)However, the view is that the absence of malicious intent for the soldier in the March 2019 incident meant he should not spend time in IDF jail – especially since by the time he was indicted in July, the soldier was no longer in the IDF.Incidentally, one reason that the soldier is being convicted of negligent homicide and not merely violating open fire rules is that the IDF was able to perform an autopsy, something which is not always possible with killed Palestinians.The Post has learned that, operationally, the IDF might refrain from leaving a soldier with a similar background alone at such a sensitive post in the future.Questions can still be raised about whether the IDF should have made an example of a soldier who opened fire in a situation when he had such a poor viewpoint that he misidentified who he was shooting at.But given the additional factual information, some of the worst questions that could have been raised probably fall by the wayside.
