An Israel Defence Force (IDF) soldier sentenced to 18 months in prison for killing a wounded Palestinian assailant has had his jail sentence postponed. Elor Azaria appealed against his mansaughter conviction and his lawyer asked that the start of his incarceration be deferred until the end of legal proceedings.
Azaria was serving as an army medic in Hebron, in the occupied West Bank, when two Palestinians stabbed and wounded another soldier. One assailant was shot dead and the other was wounded. Eleven minutes later, he took aim with his rifle and fatally shot Abd Elfatah Ashareef, 21, who was lying on the ground unable to move. A three-judge military court convicted Azaria of manslaughter last month.
The Palestinian government said the term imposed by the court had given Israeli soldiers a “green light” to carry out “executions without fear of real punishment”. The United Nations human rights office said it is “deeply disturbed” by an 18-month sentence given to an Israeli soldier for killing a wounded and unarmed Palestinian, calling it “excessively lenient” and “unacceptable”.
Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/elor-azaria-latest-i…
