Hunt for Israelis who killed Eritrean

man falsely implicated in bus attack

Haftom Zarhum shot by security guard then attacked by mob in
Beersheba after another man attacked bus in latest outbreak of violence

An injured man is taken away on a stretcher from the scene of an attack at the central bus station in
Beersheba, Israel. Photograph: Jini/Xinhua Press/Corbis

Peter Beaumont in Ein HaBesor and BeershebaMonday 19 October 2015

Israeli police are hunting members of a group of Israelis who killed an

Eritrean migrant after mistakenly identifying him as a terrorist involved in
an attack at a bus station.
Haftom Zarhum was shot repeatedly by a security guard then kicked and
spat at by a mob after going to the southern Israeli city of Beersheba to
pick up his renewed work visa. He was walking past the central bus station
with a group of friends when an Israeli Bedouin armed with a gun and knife
attacked a bus,killing an Israeli soldier and injuring 10 others.

In the panic surrounding the attack, Zarhum was identified as a suspected

accomplice, apparently based on his appearance. The Israeli daily
newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth was among several media organisations that
left no ambiguity as to why it believed he had been shot. Mondays headline
read: Just because of his skin colour.
In events that some Israeli media called a lynching, Zarhum was shot and
wounded before being shot several more times by a security guard at the
bus station as he crawled along the floor. Still alive, he was then surrounded
by people who cursed and spat at him, kicked him in the head and tried to
hit him with a chair.
As paramedics tried to rescue him, the crowd chanted Death to Arabs,
Arabs out! and Am Israel Hai (The people of Israel still live) and tried
to stop them. Its terrible, said a foreign ministry spokesman, Emmanuel
Nahshon, one of a number of officials to comment on the killing. It shows
you what a terrible situation we are in.

Object 1

Aftermath of the attack

In Beersheba on Monday, Zarhums Eritrean friends and co-workers were
gathered on a bench not far from the bus station, including Amani Tewelde
who was with him when he was killed.
We were waiting at the bus station, Tewelde said. The bus was late and
then someone started shooting. Mila went one way and I went to the other

side. They shot him twice. Then I saw them kicking him. Someone found his
visa and was holding it shouting hes Eritrean, hes not a terrorist, but no
one could hear him.
Habtom Hagos said Zarhum had been in Israel three and a half years and
was in Beerseheba to renew his work visa. He was waiting for the bus to go
back to the moshav where he lived and worked, he said. He had no gun.
Why did they shoot him?
Zarhum worked at the moshav (a cooperative agricultural community) of
Ein HaBesor near the southern Gaza border. His employer described him as
a modest and hardworking man who had fled Eritrea to Israel for safety.
He was a good guy and a hard worker who lived here, said Sagi Malchi. It
breaks my heart. I think the man was in the wrong place at the wrong
time.
Zarhums killing came after one of the most serious attacks in recent weeks
of escalating violence and underscored a febrile and dangerous atmosphere
in which there have been a number of revenge attacks on Palestinians and
Israeli Arabs. One previous attempted attack in Netanya was prevented by
other Israelis.
The Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, on Monday warned against
vigilantism. Weve a country of law. No one will take the law into his own
hands, he told his partys lawmakers in broadcast remarks on Zarhums
death.
In the past fortnight, 41 Palestinians, including assailants and
demonstrators at anti-Israeli protests, eight Israelis and one Eritrean have
been killed.
The attack on Zarhum was caught on video, with one person taking part
telling Army Radio: I saw people gathering around him. The man, only
identified as Dudu, added: I understood from the people around him he
was a terrorist. If I had known I would have helped him. In a moment of fear
and pressure you do things you dont understand.

All the people gathering around the man attacked him. Nobody was
helping him. People just were making sure he doesnt move. There is no
human being who did not kick or beat him. Everyone took part. I couldnt
sleep last night thinking about what happened and I feel sick about myself.
Another witness told the Yedioth Ahronoth website, Ynet: People took out
their rage on the wounded Eritrean and abused him. We thought he was
one of the terrorists. He was shot in the legs and the real terrorist ran
outside.
As Israeli police announced an investigation into the attack on Zarhum,
they said they were looking for individuals who had attacked him after he
was incapacitated by the first gunshot.
His employer, Malchi, said Zarhum had worked for a year running one of his
greenhouses. In general I dont know all my workers. I knew him and in the
course of the last months we spoke a lot. He was a modest guy, very quiet,
and he did his job in the best possible way.
I was watching the news and I saw what happened and I saw an Eritrean
but didnt recognise him. What I feel is sadly familiar. It is a bad day. And I
also feel bad for the family of the soldier who was killed.
Describing those involved in the brutal attack, Malchi said: It is a shame
people in Israel have this barbaric attitude. A pity that a small group of
people do this terrible service to our country.
Condemning Zarhums killing, Human Rights Watch described it as a tragic
but foreseeable outgrowth of a climate in which some Israeli politicians
encourage citizens to take the law into their own hands.
Sari Bashi, the Israel-Palestine director at HRW, added: The Israeli
authorities should investigate and prosecute those responsible for the
attack. Israel faces acute threats to public safety, but vigilantism will only
lead to more innocent people being harmed or killed.
The recent violence was set off in part by Palestinians anger over what

they see as increased Jewish encroachment on Jerusalems al-Aqsa Mosque

complex.
The US secretary of state, John Kerry, who is due to hold separate meetings
this week with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, said on Monday it was vital to
clarify the status around the compound, also revered by Jews as the
location of two destroyed biblical temples.
I dont have specific expectations except to try to move things forward,
and that will depend on the conversations themselves, Kerry told reporters
in Madrid.
Netanyahu has said he seeks no change to the decades-old status quo in
which Israel bans Jewish prayer at the al-Aqsa site in the walled old city of
East Jerusalem, captured along with the West Bank in a 1967 war.
Posted by Thavam