According to Ma’an, Israeli forces demolished the home of Arafat Irfaiya, 29, in the Wadi al-Hariya area south of Hebron. According to the IDF Spokesperson, the army had demolished two apartments in Hebron belonging to the family of Irfaiya, who “brutally and violently raped and murdered” Ori Ansbacher in Jerusalem earlier this year.
מקורות פלסטיניים דיווחו כי צה”ל הרס הלילה בחברון את ביתו של ערפאת עירפאעיה, המחבל שרצח את אורי אנסבכר לפני כחודשיים. על פי הדיווח, הכוחות נכנסו לאזור בליווי דחפור. במהלך ההריסה התפתחו עימותים בין צה”ל לבין צעירים, והכוחות ירו גז מדמיע pic.twitter.com/MiHnqIcl9B
— כאן חדשות (@kann_news)
The large forces, accompanied by a bulldozer and several heavy vehicles were deployed late on Thursday, Irfaiya’s home. According to Ma’an, clashes broke out between the IDF forces and area Arab youths. The soldiers fired tear gas at the rioters. No injuries were reported.
An Israeli court rejected the family’s petition against the decision to demolish their home.
Irfaiya bought a kipah ahead of his attack so he would be mistaken for a Jew and be allowed to enter Israeli territory. “I bought the kipah two weeks before, so I could enter Israel without being suspected or identified as an illegal resident,” Irfaiya told his interrogators. This was part of carrying out his plan to “kill a Jew due to the occupation and treatment of Arabs at checkpoints.”
Irfaiya told his interrogators that he had happened upon 19-year-old Tekoa resident Ansbacher in the woods outside Jerusalem, where she was sitting on a boulder and writing in a journal. He said he was determined to have intercourse with her “whether she consented or not.”
He then stabbed Ansbacher three times and dragged her as she was struggling to get away, stabbing her further and gagging her with her scarf before binding her hands and raping her.
Ansbacher died during the attack, and Irfaiya destroyed her cellphone and memory card to make it difficult to locate her. He was positively identified with to DNA evidence he had left at the scene.
Back in 2018, the Knesset passed an amendment to the Death Penalty to terrorists law, which changes the required majority of the panel of judges from unanimous to regular majority. Nevertheless the death penalty was not applied in Ansbacher’s murder, despite a groundswell of demands for his execution.