Israel gives soldier scapegoat 8 year sentence.
A former Israeli soldier was sentenced to eight years in prison by an Israeli military court today for shooting dead the British student Tom Hurndall in the Gaza Strip.
Taysir Hayb was convicted in June of the manslaughter of the 22-year-old Briton after shooting him in the head with a rifle from a watchtower in April 2003.
Witnesses said Mr Hurndall, from north London, was shot as he tried to usher Palestinian children out of the range of Israeli gunfire during demonstrations in the Gaza town of Rafah.
The conviction marked the first time an Israeli soldier had been found guilty of killing a foreign citizen during more than four years of Palestinian-Israeli violence.
Today the court handed Hayb, a former sergeant, an 11-and-a-half year sentence but said he would have to serve only eight years, with the rest of the term suspended.
Mr Hurndall, a member of the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement (ISM), died in a London hospital in January 2004 after lying in a coma for nine months.
His family fought a campaign to see Hayb prosecuted after the Israeli army initially denied Mr Hurndall had been shot by a soldier. It was only after pressure from the family and the British government that an official inquiry was launched.
In June, Hayb was also found guilty of obstruction of justice, incitement to false testimony, false testimony and improper conduct. The court heard how he fired at Mr Hurndall from an Israeli army watchtower, using a sniper rifle with a telescopic sight.
Hayb had faced up to 20 years in prison but the leading judge in the case, Nir Aviram, said today the panel had given him a lighter sentence after considering the tense combat situation in the area.
Israel has been embarrassed into handing down a, by Israeli army standards, very harsh sentence against a soldier who shot an innocent man in the head. It was only because this man was British and had relatives who didn't stop fighting for justice that the case happened at all. Countless Palestinians have been shot for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Unfortunately for them, they don't have the British government demanding answers about their deaths. Similarly, hundreds of Israelis have died in the path of suicide bombers. However, only one community has the power to punish in Israel and Palestine. A soldier shooting dead an innocent Palestinian is unlikely to face charges. The family of a suicide bomber will most likely find that their house will be demolished by the IDF. This is justice. This is revenge. This is life.
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