Israeli army punishes officers over elderly Palestinian-American man’s death

JERUSALEM: FEB. 1 – Israel’s military said Tuesday it has punished officers over the death of a Palestinian American man at a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank in January.

The death of the 78-year-old Omar Assad, who was allegedly beaten, was a result of “a moral failure and poor decision-making on the part of the soldiers,” the military said in a statement.

The military launched an internal probe into the incident after the Palestinian Justice Ministry concluded in their autopsy that Assad died of a heart attack induced “by psychological stress.”

The military confirmed that the soldiers failed in their obligations by leaving Assad lying on the floor without giving the required treatment and reporting the incident to their commanders, the statement said.

The investigation rejected the Palestinians’ claim that Assad was brutally beaten.

Assad was stopped and arrested at a checkpoint outside the West Bank village of Jiljiliya on Jan. 12 by Israeli soldiers after he failed to present any personal identification and refused “to cooperate with the security check,” the probe found.

He was taken to a courtyard of a nearby building under physical restraint, along with three other detained Palestinians, the statement said, adding that an hour later all three detainees “were released and freed from all constraints.”

It is not clear when exactly Assad passed away. The statement said that after the troops cut his zip-ties, they left him with his face down on the ground because they believed he “was asleep.”

The military said that the commander of the battalion will be reprimanded and a platoon commander and company commander will both “be removed from their positions and will not serve in commanding roles for two years,” the army said.

-Xinhua