ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS/TODDLER-REAX Palestinians to go to ICC over toddler killing - Abbas

Record ID: 145533

  • Title: ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS/TODDLER-REAX Palestinians to go to ICC over toddler killing - Abbas
  • Date: 31st July 2015
  • Summary: DUMA, WEST BANK (JULY 31, 2015) (REUTERS) BURNED HOUSE OF THE TODDLER FAMILY
  • Embargoed: 15th August 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVACK14EFGIZAB0VQXPG4ZUPYYZJ
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he would go to the International Criminal Court over the killing of a toddler by suspected Jewish arsonists on Friday (July 31).
    Suspected Jewish attackers torched a Palestinian home in the occupied West Bank, killing an 18-month-old child and seriously injuring his parents and older brother. Israel's prime minister has described the attack as "terrorism".
    Abbas called the attack a "war crime".
    "We will not stand still at all. As long as the occupation and settlement exist these acts (attacks) will continue. We are preparing the file of this crime, and the previous crimes to send it immediately to the International Criminal Court, and nothing will stop us and there is no excuse not to go there (to the ICC)," Abbas told a news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
    The house in Duma, a village near the city of Nablus, had its windows smashed and fire bombs thrown inside shortly before dawn as the family slept, the military and witnesses said.
    Graffiti in Hebrew reading "revenge" was scrawled outside.
    Both the child's parents and his four-year-old brother were badly hurt. They were taken by helicopter for treatment in an Israeli hospital, officials said. A second house in the village was also set ablaze, but no one was at home.
    Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon condemned the attack.
    "The torching and murder of the baby Ali Dawabsheh in the village of Duma this morning is a heinous crime. Terrorism we can not tolerate. That is why we are exerting every effort to catch these terrorist murderers wherever they are."
    "I wish the rest of the family a quick recovery. We flew them by helicopters for treatment at hospitals in Israel. I call on every reasonable person in Judea and Samaria and anywhere else to condemn this abhorrent murder and not to encourage people from amongst us to commit such act," Yaalon said.
    It was the worst attack by Israeli assailants since a Palestinian teenager was torched to death in Jerusalem a year ago. That followed the kidnapping and killing of three Israeli teenagers by Palestinian militants in the West Bank.
    The Israeli military boosted forces in the area to search for the suspects, described by a spokesman as "two masked terrorists", and prevent any escalation in violence. The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas called for revenge.
    The Palestinians seek a state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. In the West Bank, they have limited self rule but nearly 60 percent of the territory remains under the full control of the Israeli military.
    Israeli settlements are considered illegal under international law. The last round of U.S.-brokered peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down in 2014.
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