BICOM

Two Israelis were arrested yesterday after using social media to threaten violence against the judges who earlier this week convicted an Israeli soldier of unlawfully killing a wounded Palestinian attacker.

A panel of three judges in a military court found Elor Azaria guilty of manslaughter on Wednesday, after he killed an incapacitated Palestinian assailant in the West Bank city of Hebron last March.

Azaria’s defence team plan to launch an appeal and those supporting Azaria’s case, including numerous prominent political leaders, have called for him to be pardoned. The case sparked intense and often bitter public debate both during its proceedings and has continued to stir strong emotions following the verdict.

A 54-year-old man from Jerusalem was arrested yesterday after he wrote a Facebook post in which he declared that Col. Maya Heller, who headed the judges’ panel, “will not finish her year”. He said that “those who support the conviction of a ‘soldier in God’s army’ will receive a bitter fate”.

The unnamed man was placed under house arrest, is banned from coming near Judge Heller and is barred from using any media device for the next 14 days.

A 22-year-old woman from Kiryat Gat was also arrested for saying, in a Faceook post about Heller:  In reference to Heller, she took to Facebook saying “Take a grenade and blow up the judge and scatter all of her parts in different places, let the dogs eat her. God will make her pay for everything.”

She was released from house arrest after agreeing not to contact Heller or post on Facebook for the next 30 days.

Heller and the two other military judges have been given a special security detail by the IDF.

Supreme Court President Miriam Naor issued a statement yesterday condemning the “unprecedented attacks”. She said: “Pointed criticism of verdicts are of course legitimate, but what is happening now crosses all lines of legitimate discourse and represents a threat to the rule of law and democracy.”