Petah Tikva resident Zohar Zuaretz accused of 'price tag' act, publishing numerous Facebook posts calling for slaughter of ArabsThe Petah Tikva Magistrate's Court on Monday indicted an Israeli man who published virulent anti-Arab posts on Facebook on charges including incitement to violence, incitement to racism and support for a terror organization.Between 2012 and 2017, Zohar Zuaretz, 33, a Jewish resident of Petah Tikva in central Israel, published numerous posts calling for acts of violence to be carried out against Arabs as well as Israeli security forces, according to the charge sheet. He continued to do so despite being arrested and questioned several times for his posts.In one post, Zuarets wrote about a "rosy" dream he had in which he decapitated Arab babies.Zuaretz, who had over a thousand followers reading his posts, published posts such asand "How did we not think of establishing a 'price tag' political party," a reference to anti-Arab hate crimes.Zuaretz wrote in one of his posts, apparently in the aftermath of a terror attack against Israelis."For every murdered Jew, we need to avenge an entire people responsible for harming him! For a single Jew to live we are required to exterminate entire peoples, even millions of people!" he wrote.Zuaretz was also charged with carrying out a "price tag" attack in which he vandalized a police car, spray-painting the vehicle and slashing its tires.He spray-painted "death to Arabs" and other slogans on two buses belonging to the Afikim company, which serves both Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank.The indictment also cited a post Zuaretz made against the IDF following the conviction of Elor Azaria, a soldier who shot dead an already subdued Palestinian assailant in Hebron in March 2016."A true Jew does not enlist in the evil, infidel's army. Go and do things alone. It's time to start a rebellion. I'm expecting all the soldiers to defect and direct their weapons in the right direction," he wrote.Prosecutors concluded that Zuaretz posed a "clear risk of continuing criminal offenses on the internet, which would endanger the security of the Arab community and security forces." </s> The Petah Tikva Magistrate’s Court on Monday indicted an Israeli man who published virulent anti-Arab posts on Facebook on charges including incitement to violence, incitement to racism and support for a terror organization.

Between 2012 and 2017, Zohar Zuaretz, 33, a Jewish resident of Petah Tikva in central Israel, published numerous posts calling for acts of violence to be carried out against Arabs as well as Israeli security forces, according to the charge sheet. He continued to do so despite being arrested and questioned several times for his posts.

Examples of posts by the far-right radical included calls to “exterminate” millions of Arabs in response for attacks against Israelis.

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In one post, Zuarets wrote about a “rosy” dream he had in which he decapitated Arab babies.

“Wow, what a dream I had! I go into a hospital’s maternity ward and there are all the cradles with babies inside. I draw out a butcher knife from my coat and go to every baby and if it’s Arab, I decapitate it. Wherever there is a Jewish baby I place Tikkun HaKlali [a religious Jewish book also known as The General Remedy]. The rosiest dream I’ve ever had!”

Zuaretz, who had over a thousand followers reading his posts, published posts such as “May all Arabs and left-wingers be burned!” and “How did we not think of establishing a ‘price tag’ political party,” a reference to anti-Arab hate crimes.

“Dear Jews! It is time for a holy war — go out and slaughter all the Arabs with anything you can find! Revenge!” Zuaretz wrote in one of his posts, apparently in the aftermath of a terror attack against Israelis.

“For every murdered Jew, we need to avenge an entire people responsible for harming him! For a single Jew to live we are required to exterminate entire peoples, even millions of people!” he wrote.

Zuaretz was also charged with carrying out a “price tag” attack in which he vandalized a police car, spray-painting the vehicle and slashing its tires.

He spray-painted “death to Arabs” and other slogans on two buses belonging to the Afikim company, which serves both Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank.

The indictment also cited a post Zuaretz made against the IDF following the conviction of Elor Azaria, a soldier who shot dead an already subdued Palestinian assailant in Hebron in March 2016.

“A true Jew does not enlist in the evil, infidel’s army. Go and do things alone. It’s time to start a rebellion. I’m expecting all the soldiers to defect and direct their weapons in the right direction,” he wrote.

Prosecutors concluded that Zuaretz posed a “clear risk of continuing criminal offenses on the internet, which would endanger the security of the Arab community and security forces.” </s> Michael Kadar, an American-Israeli man convicted of terrorizing Jewish community centers across the U.S. with a wave of bogus bomb threats, was sentenced by a court in Tel Aviv to 10 years in prison Thursday.

Unidentified by Israeli media outlets on account of starting his crime spree while still a minor, the dual citizen was found guilty in June in connection with placing thousands of threatening phone calls against various victims in the U.S. and abroad between 2015 and 2017, including airports, airlines, schools and Jewish community centers.

Israeli outlets described the so-called “JCC hoax bomber” as the same person previously charged with related crimes by the U.S. Department of Justice, consequently revealing his identity as Kadar.

The Justice Department charged Kadar, 20, last year with dozens of counts connected to a wave of threatening calls placed against U.S. victims prior to his March 2017 arrest, and prosecutors subsequently filed federal hate crimes charges against him in Feb. 2018.

The dual citizen issued more than 2,000 threats prior to his arrest, according to the Israeli State Prosecutor’s office, and the U.S. Justice Department has previously identified his targets as Jewish centers in at least three states, as well as the Orlando International Airport, the Anti-Defamation League’s headquarters and the Israeli Embassy in D.C., among other targets.

“When individuals target victims of their crimes based on who they are, what they believe, or how they worship, they target the bedrock principles on which our nation was founded,” former Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement issued when the Justice Department announced the hate crime charges against Kadar.

Discussing the crimes during Thursday’s sentencing hearing, Tel Aviv District Court Judge Zvi Gurfinkel described the impact the bogus bomb threats had on victims flying aboard airlines targeted by his threats.

“One can easily imagine the terror, the fear and the horror that gripped the airplane passengers who were forced to make an emergency landing, some of whom were injured while evacuating the plane and the terrified panic caused when there was a need to evacuate pupils from schools because of fake bomb threats,” he wrote in his verdict, The New York Times reported.

Kadar did not deny responsibility during trial, instead blaming his actions on his autism, Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported.

“Were it not for his condition, I would have sentenced him to 17 years in prison,” Judge Gurfinkel ruled Thursday, according to JWire, a Jewish news service that covered the case.

“This is the most cruel, cruel thing in the world,” Kadar’s mother said of the sentencing, The New York Times reported. “I’m very sorry, but I am ashamed that the country acts this way.”

Representatives for the Justice Department did not immediately comment on the sentence. </s> Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been indicted on public corruption charges after a two-year investigation and less than six weeks before the nation’s general election, Israel’s attorney general announced Thursday.

Netanyahu — who is currently serving in his third consecutive term as prime minister and fourth overall — faces one count of bribery and two counts of fraud and breach of trust, NBC News reported.

The most serious charge alleges Netanyahu provided regulatory concessions to Shaul Elovitch, the controlling shareholder in Bezeq telecommunications, in exchange for favorable media coverage from Bezeq’a news site, called Walla, according to Haaretz.

The prime minister is also accused of accepting gifts from wealthy business figures in exchange for political favors.

Another charge centers around an alleged deal with Arnon Mozes for favorable news coverage in return for supporting legislation to damage the newspaper Israel Hayom, owned by American businessman Sheldon Adelson.

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“I’m very worried for freedom of the press and freedom of government in Israel if they start indicting people for trying to get good coverage from the media,” Dershowitz told Army Radio, according to The Times of Israel.

“I don’t know of any other country that has criminalized trying to get good coverage and make that a basis of bribery or any other corruption investigation.”

Israeli law professor Said Avi Bell told NBC News that the indictment inserts law enforcement into the nation’s politics “in an unprecedented way, and on a very shaky legal foundation.”

Netanyahu’s Likud Party responded to the indictment announcement, saying in a statement that “there is nothing” to the cases.

The party accused “the media and the left” of pressuring a “weak” attorney general into the decision. “No one is surprised by the announcement.”

The statement further claimed that “the witch hunt against the prime minister began with an attempt to hit him with four bribery cases. Even before the hearing, three of those have collapsed.”

Asked about the then-anticipated indictment announcement, President Donald Trump told reporters in Vietnam that he did not know about the specific charges.

“I think he’s been a great prime minister,” he said.

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“He’s done a great job as prime minister,” the president added. “He’s tough, he’s smart, he’s strong.”

We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards. </s> Israeli security forces on Wednesday arrested Zakaria Zubeidi, a former Palestinian terrorist leader long sought by Israeli law enforcement, on suspicion that he was engaged in “serious and current terrorist activities,” the Shin Bet said.

In addition to Zubeidi, Israeli forces also arrested on similar charges the attorney Tarek Barghout, who often represents terror suspects.

“This morning, in a joint operation by the Shin Bet security service, Israel Defense Forces and Israel Police, Zakaria Zubeidi and Tarek Barghout were arrested in connection with their involvement in serious and current terrorist activities,” the Shin Bet said in a statement.

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The security service refused to elaborate on the nature of the suspicions against Zubeidi and Barghout.

The two men were arrested in the Ramallah area of the central West Bank, the Shin Bet said.

According to Palestinian media, Israeli forces also confiscated Barghout’s car in Ramallah.

מקורות פלסטיניים מדווחים כי כוחות צה"ל נכנסו לרמאללה תחתית. על פי הדיווחים, הכוחות ביצעו חיפוש במקום בו שהה טארק ברגות שנעצר והחרימו את מכוניתו @nurityohanan pic.twitter.com/AsEzEBdKoP — כאן חדשות (@kann_news) February 27, 2019

During the Second Intifada, Zubeidi served as the commander of the Jenin region of Fatah’s military wing, the al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades. He was also suspected of being one of the chief architects of several terror attacks during the early 2000s.

Zubeidi, who also helped found Jenin’s Freedom Theatre in 2006, evaded capture by Israeli forces for years, before the Israeli government offered him and several other al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades members amnesty in 2007.

While he was wanted by Israel for his terrorist activities, Zubeidi began a relationship with an Israeli woman, Tali Fahima, in 2004. Fahima moved into Zubeidi’s Jenin home in order to act as a human shield and prevent Israel from conducting an airstrike to kill him. She was later arrested and convicted of assisting an enemy in wartime.

In December 2011, the Israeli government rescinded Zubeidi’s amnesty without public explanation. Zubeidi has been on Jerusalem’s wanted list ever since.

Initially, Zubeidi evaded capture by Israeli forces by remaining in Palestinian Authority custody in Ramallah. He was released by the PA and permitted to return to Jenin in 2017.
Petah Tikva resident Zohar Zuaretz is indicted on counterterror charges for far right social media posts in which he spoke of killing Arabs.