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Site of terror attack in Halamish, July 2017 (Credit: IDF)

The Palestinian who slaughtered three members of the Salomon family in Halamish on July 21 received four life sentences from the Judea Military Court on Thursday.One of the three judges on the panel dissented, voting to give Omar al-Abed the death penalty.The split vote immediately reignited the debate over giving certain terrorists the death penalty – an initiative D efense Minister Avigdor Liberman and others have pushed forward , but has been consistently opposed by the Justice Ministry.Liberman reacted saying that no number of life sentences was enough, and other politicians and NGOs attacked the decision as too soft.Abed was also fined NIS 1,000,800.In the August indictment filed by the IDF’s Judea and Samaria Prosecution, Abed was charged with the murders of Elad Salomon, Haya Salomon and Yosef Salomon, the stabbing of Tovah Salomon and the attempted murder of other members of the Salomon family.According to the indictment, Abed was inspired to carry out a terrorist attack on Jews following the July 14 terrorist attack on the Temple Mount, which left two Druse Israel Police officers dead. After failing at his initial plan to acquire a bomb or other more powerful weapons, he decided to carry out the attack with his father’s 22-centimeter knife.He successfully got past four different fences around Halamish. One fence he crawled under through a hole, one he cut through with scissors and two he climbed over using trees close to the fences.After making his way through the Halamish cemetery to the main residential road, he noticed that one house seemed quiet and unoccupied, while he heard laughter emanating from the Salomons’ house.Upon hearing the laughter, he decided to carry out his attack on the Salomon family.He entered the house and first attacked and killed grandmother and mother Haya Salomon.Next, he stabbed Tovah Salomon, daughter of Haya and Yosef. But Tovah eventually succeeded at escaping up the stairs to the second floor where she hid with five Salomon children and with Michal Salomon, Elad Salomon’s wife.Elad Salomon, son of Haya and Yosef and a father of five, fought an extended back-and-forth with Abed, even succeeding at one point and grabbing the knife. But, eventually, Abed overcame Elad, regained the knife and stabbed him numerous times until he was dead.Having killed Haya and Elad, Abed started to stab Yosef, who offered less resistance, and after stabbing him numerous times, Yosef also died on the spot.Before Abed could start moving to the second floor to attack the rest of the Salomons, an off-duty soldier who lived nearby and heard the commotion came to the scene and shot Abed until he was “neutralized.”Security forces later detained the terrorist.The indictment also charged Abed with other prior violent crimes.The off-duty soldier was given an award for bravery and was praised by the IDF for showing restraint in not unnecessarily killing the terrorist – in contrast to the “Hebron shooter,” who shot a “neutralized” terrorist dead in March 2016.