Israel Police now say they will "cautiously" investigate the killing of an Eritrean man, Haftom Zarhum, who was gunned down after a terror attack, apparently because he was Black, looked foreign, and was nearby. As he lay bleeding, a mob of Jews kicked, stomped and beat him. Zarhum died several hours later.
Cops – Belatedly – Agree To Investigate Killing Of Eritrean Man After Terror Attack
Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com
Ha'aretz reports that this morning, more than 12 hours after they should have done so, Israel Police decided to investigate the yesterday's attack on an innocent Eritrean man Haftom Zarhum in Beersheba's central bus station.
Like dozens of other people, Zarhum was fleeing a terrorist who stabbed an IDF soldier, stole the soldier's rifle, and began shooting random people.
But unlike the other people he was fleeing with, Zarhum had dark skin. And that, combined with being a few seconds behind the others, caused a security guard to shoot him multiple times – including shooting him when he was already downed and clearly not posing a threat – even an broadly construed one.
Once lying on the cold floor of the bus station and bleeding profusely, posing absolutely no threat to anyone, Zarhum was savagely kicked and beaten by Jews. The Jews who did this clearly intended to kill him, and Zarhum died from his wounds later in a Beersheba hospital.
You'd think there would be outrage in Israel, but there isn't. Zarhum was nothing more than human refuse to most Jewish Israelis while he lived, a "cushi" (n*g@er), an "infiltrator," a "schvartze African." Netanyahu's government refused to call Zarhum and thousands like him what they really are – refugees – and treats them despicably.
That Zarhum had fled the most brutal dictatorship in the world does not matter. That international law clearly categorized him as a refugee does not matter.
In the Israel of Benjamin Netanyahu and Naftali Bennett, Shmuel Eliyahu and Meir Mazuz, and Shas and Yair Lapid, Zarhum and others like him are nothing more than "infiltrators" and unwanted "economic migrants" who have the double misfortune of also being "Black Africans."
Zarhum was already a demonized Other when the Likud Party's Miri Regev, a former Brigadier-General in the Israel Defense Forces (where she served as IDF Spokeswoman) called Zarhum and thousands of others like him a "cancer" three years ago at a racist public rally in South Tel Aviv. (Regev is now Israel's Minister of Culture and Sport.) He was demonized Other when Netanyahu and his henchmen and women relegated all African asylum seekers to the refuse heap in order to protect the purity of the Jewish people.
Zarhum was a demonized Other long before the Beersheba attack, and that demonization almost certainly helped get him killed. The man who repeatedly pulled the trigger and shot a defenseless Black man and the other men who kicked, stomped and beat that Black man as he lay bleeding had years of racist lies from Netanyahu and Regev and Eli Yishai and a bevy of rabbis and other politicians to encourage their barbarity.
Add to that the open incitement to mob vigilante violence from followers of the late extremist Rabbi Meir Kahane and the open incitement to mob vigilante violence from the likes of Chief Rabbi of Sefat Shmuel Eliyahu and Eli Yishai's "spiritual leader" Rabbi Meir Mazuz.
What do you get?
A dead Eritrean asylum seeker.
"Collateral damage of war," as some apologists for years of Israeli racism call it.
Police said this morning they will investigate Zarhum's death – but not his murder. despite the fact that security camera footage and cellphone footage shows both the security guard and the mob acted improperly and criminally, cops vehemently insisted the investigation into Zarhum's death is not a manslaughter investigation.
Why?
Follow the logic of Israel's police force, the same police force that has made it a habit to beat, harass and otherwise trouble Ethiopian Jews based on the color of their skin.
Because Zarhum was injured by the guard's bullets, the men who subsequently beat him can't be charged with manslaughter or murder – a claim that would get you laughed out of courtrooms in most civilized countries, especially because Zarhum lived for several hours after he was beaten.
But what about the guard? Couldn't he be charged with murder or manslaughter?
He could be, but he won't because, in the Israeli mind intentionally shooting a random Black man who was doing absolutely nothing wrong is fine. After all, Zarhum looked foreign, he looked Black the way some darker skinned Arabs look Black, and even though he posed no threat to anyone, the security guard had the right to shoot him. After all, he fit the profile.
Ha'aretz reported police said they will proceed with this belated 'investigation' of theirs "cautiously" because they do not want to deter citizens from acting to stop terrorist attacks, but since Zarhum was defenseless when he was beaten, they feel they need to take a look at what happened.
But what happened is that Israeli rightist politicians and rabbis created an atmosphere in which mob violence and hatred of the shvartze Others became accepted, even in polite society. What happened came from years of racism and years of Jewish purity claims. And it came from a wild west shoot to kill mentality encouraged by the right.
Note there are no rabbis or Jewish politicians, even from the left, standing up to demand a more thorough police investigation and I've heard of no one who has done anything to try to find Zarhum's family and friends or comfort them.
No one really cares. After all, what was Zarhum anyway? Just an "infiltrator." Human refuse. And now Netanyahu can finally deport him, albeit in a body bag. And then Israel will that much "purer."
Watch the videos of Zarhum being beaten here.