by Stephen Lendman

Last July, extremist settlers set the Dawabsha family home ablaze. Husband and wife Saad and Riham were killed. So was their 18-month-old infant Ali.

Four-year-old Ahmed alone survived, still hospitalized months later, painfully recovering from third-degree burns - justice so far denied him and people of conscience everywhere for this brutal high crime.

Last September, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon admitted knowing who killed Ahmed’s parents and infant brother. He refused to arrest them on the phony pretext of “protect(ing) the identity” of alleged intelligence sources - effectively saying it’s OK to murder Palestinians.

At the time, a senior IDF official said security agencies have “no doubt” that immolating Dawabsha family members “was an act of Jewish terrorism, and that’s unambiguous.”

“All the conjecture and speculations being spread on this issue lack any basis in reality.” Eyewitnesses saw four individuals leave the crime scene.

Last week, Israeli authorities arrested two settler youths in connection with the immolation murders. A gag order prevents information made public Israelis and Palestinians have a right to know - confirmation of the arrests alone released.

Names withheld are known, teenagers Hanoch Ganiram and Elisha Odess. They’ve been interrogated but not charged. Two other suspects seen leaving the scene of the crime have yet to be apprehended.

Riham Dawabsha’s father, Hussein, holds Israel responsible for the crime. He’s been told nothing officially, aware of the two arrests from media reports.

Last October, Ganiram was remanded to house arrest in Hebron. On December 1, he was arrested after leaving home to attend a wedding.

His grandfather, Yitzhak, was notorious - a Jewish terrorist underground member, responsible for murdering Palestinians with impunity decades earlier.

Meretz party MK Esawi Frej petitioned Israel’s High Court to demand indictments for the Dawabsha family killers. Three-and-a-half months after the immolation deaths, no one was charged - despite Israeli authorities knowing the perpetrators’ names.

On December 11, Maan News (MN) said Israeli authorities released Ganiram, one of perhaps four settlers responsible for the Dawabsha family killings.

Without naming him because of Israel’s gag order, MN said he’s “connected to a Jewish extremist organization.”

He was “transferred to house arrest for five days at his home in the illegal Israeli settlement of Benyamin, east of Ramallah city” after his early December arrest.

MN called his Friday release “unexpected.” Last week, Israeli authorities announced several detentions without disclosing names.

Information regarding the case remains secret - smacking of typical Israeli coverup and whitewash, perhaps intending no prosecutions, convictions and imprisonments for a high crime demanding accountability.

Last July, Netanyahu and other Israeli officials called what happened “terrorism,” promising swift justice. At the time, B’Tselem blasted their duplicity, saying:

“Official condemnations of this attack are empty rhetoric as long as politicians continue their policy of avoiding enforcement of the law on Israelis who harm Palestinians, and do not deal with the public climate and the incitement which serve as backdrop to these acts.”

Chance for justice going forward remains virtually nil. Israel remains focused on murdering an average of two Palestinians daily, brutalizing an entire population held hostage under suffocating occupation, a longstanding high crime against humanity - ignored by the world community.

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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks World War III".

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

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