This time, the terrorist was Jewish.

last updated 8 January 2015

Israel

All of Israel is horrified—and ashamed, said Alex Fischman in Tel Aviv’s Yedioth Ahronoth. Last week, an Israeli soldier who deserted the army in protest over the planned withdrawal from Gaza turned into a terrorist. Eden Natan Zada calmly boarded a bus in Shfaram and opened fire, killing four Arabs before he was beaten to death by an Arab mob. The question, of course, isn’t how someone could target civilians—after all, we’ve seen it often enough from the Palestinian side—but rather why, in this case, couldn’t the army or security services have prevented it? Zada’s own family had reported him to the police, worried that he had taken up with religious extremists. The army knew that he was unstable and AWOL, in possession of his weapon, nursing a grievance against Arabs. They should have put out a “manhunt” for him. Instead, five people are dead. “The bottom line is that this is a scandal.” The government has launched an investigation of the police, army, and security services to pinpoint the breakdown in security.

What a contrast with Palestinian reactions to Palestinian suicide bombers, said The Jerusalem Post in an editorial. “No segment of Israeli society has condoned this attack, much less cheered it.” No group offered Zada’s family a cash bonus. “No frenzied thousands are waiting to march with Zada’s coffin, to vow more bloodshed and glorify him as a heroic martyr.” Instead, the family is having a difficult time finding a cemetery willing to accept his body. Left and right alike joined in expressions of “genuine revulsion,” in contrast to the “reluctant condemnations” that Palestinian authorities so often pronounce against Palestinian suicide bombers. Settlement leaders themselves called Zada “a crazy man,” “a lunatic,” and “a terrorist.”