A Young Israeli Couple Is Murdered: Who Is To Blame?

UPDATES and TODAY’S BLOG

9:00 am Israel time, Friday, October 2 2015

Na’ama and Eitam Henkin with one of their children (whose face has been blocked for obvious reasons).

Yesterday morning at this time Na’ama (30) and Eitam (31) Henkin were young, vibrant residents of the Neria Jewish community in Samaria.

Na’ama was a popular, well-known graphic designer, and Eitam was a beloved Rabbi, teacher, and author. They were deeply in love, went everywhere together, and had four wonderful children (ages 9, 7, 4, and 4 months).

This morning Na’ama and Eitam are dead.  In two hours they will be buried at Har HaMenuchot Cemetery in Jerusalem.

They were slaughtered in a gruesome Palestinian terror attack last night at 9:05 pm on Road 555 between Elon Moreh and Itamar. According to evidence at the scene, two Palestinian “drive-by” terrorists stopped the Henkins’ car, opened the driver’s door and the passenger side door, and opened fire with automatic rifles.

When MADA and security forces arrived on the scene shortly thereafter, they found Na’ama still sitting in the front seat, her dead body riddled with bullets from her torso to her head.

They found Eitan lying dead on the road beside the car. Somehow, he had managed to open his door and stagger out before he fell to the pavement and died.

The Henkins’ car. Eitam’s body has been blurred out on the pavement (picture: Walla).

What you cannot see from the above picture:

Eitan got his own door open, apparently fell against the rear door, and then onto the road before he died (picture: Walla).

Their four children who had been with them  were in the back seat of the car, splattered with the blood of their parents, alive, but in severe shock. The nine-year-old saw the terrorists.

What can we say this morning about this tragedy?

In your humble servant’s opinion, blame can be laid directly at the feet of Mahmoud Abbas and the Netanyahu government.

Incitement to violence has always been part of the PLO creed, but the last few months have seen Abbas and his terrorist cronies outdo themselves. Not an hour goes by now that some Palestinian official does not call upon Palestinians to take up arms against Israelis. Not an hour goes by that some Palestinian official does not call Jews “extremist murderers”. Not an hour goes by that Abbas does not call upon Palestinians to march to Jerusalem to defend the Al-Aksa Mosque.

Do you want to read a good example of Abbas incitement? Click here to read a transcript of his address to the U.N. last Wednesday night.  PM Netanyahu talked about this Abbas’ incitement in his speech last night at the United Nations.

Reward for violence against Israelis is also part of the PLO creed. The more Israelis you kill and the longer your sentence in prison is, the more money your family will be paid by the PLO. The more Israelis you kill, the more schools and roads and town squares will be named after you. The more Israelis you kill, the more heroic you are. That is the message of Mahmoud Abbas and the PLO.

But the problem is not merely Abbas and the PLO.

The problem is also the government of PM Benjamin Netanyahu. Since Netanyahu took office back in 2009, he has presided over two governments that have systematically undermined Jews in Judea, Samaria, and eastern Jerusalem.

Not only has construction been virtually paralyzed by Netanyahu, but also he has given “Defense” Minister Moshe Ya’alon free hand to uproot fledgling communities while at the same time offering more and more “peace gestures” to the Palestinians. In the name of political correctness, checkpoints have been taken down and roads opened.

But even worse, the government has turned a blind eye to the thousands of terror incidents that have occurred in Judea and Samaria.

Take yesterday for example.

After the Henkins were massacred, Palestinians attacked Israelis with “rocks” at Gilad Shomron at 9:50 pm. An Israeli woman was wounded near Yitzhar (see map below) at 10:15 pm. An infant was wounded in the back seat of a car near Yitzhar at 11:45 pm.

Before the Henkins were massacred, Palestinians attacked Israelis at Hizma, Psagot Benjamin, Hebron, Beit Anun, Kfar Etzion, and tens of other places. As noted in the breaking news above, a mother and her children were attacked at Tekoa and nearly killed. Here’s what the front and back of her car looked like:

The front:

The back:

Again, it is a miracle that she and her children were only wounded and not killed.

As regular readers of this blog know, attacks like this and the ones described above happen all the time everyday. Where is the Netanyahu government?

Everyone knows where the attacks are going to occur. Even if you have never been to Israel, if you do nothing but read israelstreet, you would see that the same communities, the same roads, the same junctions are targeted everyday.

Look at the map below:

The white areas are Area C. Note the “red” road coming out of Elon Moreh. The attack on the Henkins apparently occurred where that road forks–with the “black” road going toward Shechem (Nablus) and “red” one curving back and forth toward Itamar.  On the red road, it is 12.2 km from Elon Moreh to Itamar, a journey that should take about 10 minutes.

How many times have you read in this blog about attacks at Yitzhar (Yizhar on the map)? Shechem (Nablus on the map)? Itamar? Elon Moreh? Beit Furik?

And what about the road from Elon Moreh to Itamar? Doesn’t that seem like an obvious point of attack? Do you have any idea how many times Palestinians have ambushed Israelis motorists on Road 555?

The amazing fact is that there are Israeli military bases all over area (3 in the above tiny area alone), and yet there is no concerted effort to protect community members or stamp out Palestinian terrorism.

As always, your humble servant goes back to the same point. Tomorrow morning, Israel should annex Area C to this country. Maybe then, the government will begin to treat Jews living in Judea and Samaria as first-class citizens.

In closing, may the memory of Na’ama and Eitam Henkel be forever blessed. And may their children be loved and nurtured and grow up to love Israel as much as their parents did.