Settler fined for killing Palestinian boy

JERUSALEM -- The father of a Palestinian boy kicked and beaten to death by a Jewish settler has accused the court of issuing a "licence to kill" for its sentence of community service and a fine.

The Jerusalem District Court sentenced Nahum Korman, 36, to six months of community service and a 70,000 shekels ($17,500) fine for the killing of Hilmi Shusha, 11, in the West Bank in October 1996.

Judge Ruth Or said she was not sending Korman to jail because the Supreme Court had convicted him only of "manslaughter by negligence."

Palestinians described Korman's sentence as an example of justice system that favours Israelis over Palestinians.

Or acquitted Korman at his original trial, but the Supreme Court later overturned the verdict. While Korman does not face any additional jail time, he spent nine months in jail after his arrest.

The sentence was agreed upon by the prosecution and the defence, although Korman still insists that he did not touch the boy.

At the time of the Hilmi's death, Korman was security officer at a Jewish settlement near Bethlehem and drove into a nearby Palestinian village looking for Palestinians who had been throwing rocks at passing Israeli cars.

The prosecution contended that Korman beat and kicked the child, knocked him down, put his foot on the boy's neck and struck him with a pistol. The boy suffered a head injury and a fractured spinal cord and died the next day in a hospital.

The boy's father, Said Shusha, speaking on Israel Radio, condemned the prosecution for agreeing to the sentence.

Korman initially said the boy fainted, but later changed his testimony and said the boy tripped while running away and struck his neck on a rock or a piece of scrap metal. Or rejected the findings of the chief state pathologist.

In contrast, the Supreme Court accepted the pathologist's findings that the injury could have been caused only by a blow, not by the boy's falling or fainting, as Korman claimed.

However, the Supreme Court ruled that Korman's responsibility was limited, since he tried to revive the boy and therefore had not intended to kill him.

Israeli lawmaker Naomi Chazan, of the left-wing Meretz party, denounced the sentence, saying: "It shows how little respect is shown for Palestinian life."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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The Israeli Government, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Palestinian National Authority

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