Court finds two Israeli minors guilty of burning to death Mohammed Abu Khdeir but delays ruling over the accused ringleader, Yosef Haim Ben David, 31

Two Israeli youths who kidnapped, beat and burned to death Palestinian teenager Mohammed Abu Khdeir last year, have been found guilty of murder.



The court, however, accepted a petition from lawyers for the accused ringleader – Yosef Haim Ben David, 31 – to reconsider a claim of insanity.

The panel of three judges acknowledged in their ruling that Ben David had committed the murder but said he could not be convicted at this time because of his mental state, setting a new sentencing hearing in January.

Mohammed’s father, Hussein, denounced the verdict, telling Israeli Army Radio that the trial was “a lie”.

The two minors, whose names have not been released, were convicted after a lengthy trial of kidnapping the 16-year-old last July and killing him in the Jerusalem Forest.

The killing took place shortly after three Jewish youths, who had been kidnapped in the West Bank, were found murdered near Hebron.

The case prompted serious disturbances last year as details emerged of the Palestinian boy’s murder, prompting international condemnation.

The three were arrested a few days after the killing and admitted to it, re-enacting the murder in the forest where his body was found.

Amid the outcry over the killing, Israel recognised Mohammed as a victim of terrorism.

Earlier in the case at Jerusalem district court, an attempt by Ben David’s legal team to claim insanity was rejected after the court ruled no evidence of insanity had been produced.

But on Thursday, Ben David’s lawyer submitted a psychiatric evaluation claiming again that he was not responsible for his actions at the time of the murder. The prosecution had argued that Ben David was responsible for his acts and fit to stand trial.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Relatives of Mohammed Abu Khdeir hold his picture during a protest in July last year. Photograph: Anna Ferensowicz/Pacific/Barcroft

As the case unfolded, the three defendants turned on each other with the two accused minors attempting to place most of the blame on Ben David, who they said had given them pills before the killing.

One of the minors claimed he had remained in the car during the killing and did not know that the kidnapping – which they claimed was in revenge for the kidnap and murder of the three Israeli youths – would end in murder.

“He has repeatedly said that Ben David did it alone,” said the teenager’s lawyer. “He acknowledges that they abducted [Mohammed] but he had no idea it would end in murder.”

The Palestinian teenager’s parents attended every court session and expressed regular dissatisfaction with the lengthy delays in the legal process.



“Why haven’t they demolished the homes of these three murderers,” Hussein Abu Khdeir asked at the last court session. “If they were Arabs, their homes would have been demolished immediately. Because they burned my son alive, people today are stabbing.”

Speaking to reporters outside, he said: “The court behaves one way with Arabs and another way with Jews.” He called the last-minute psychiatric report by Ben David’s lawyers a “trick” and asked why it was not submitted earlier.

The case had revealed details of killing and the motivation behind it, including how the three defendants had spent three hours driving around looking for a victim before spotting Mohammed at around 4am outside a mosque near his home.

According to the indictment, the two convicted teenagers held the struggling 16-year-old until Ben David ordered one of them to “end him”. One of the minors then choked Mohammed until he passed out.

In the forest an argument ensued over the fact that Ben David was not as active in the attack as the two youths, leading him to take a crowbar and batter Mohammed while shouting the names of Israelis who had died in recent attacks by Palestinians.

They squirted a flammable liquid over the teenager and set fire to him while he was unconscious but still alive.

After destroying evidence in a Jerusalem park, the three went to Ben David’s home in the West Bank settlement of Adam, played guitar and went to sleep.

