The Military Appeals Court on Sunday rejected an appeal submitted by Amjad Walid Suleiman Na’alwa and doubled his punishment.
Amjad is the brother of terrorist Ashraf Na’alwa who murdered Kim Leverngrond-Yehezkel and Ziv Hajbi in the Barkan industrial park in October 2018.
The court reversed the decision on his one-year sentence, saying that the punishment was very lenient concerning his actions.
Amjad was convicted in a Samaria Military Court for failing to prevent an offense. He knew his brother was carrying an illegal weapon but did nothing to prevent the offense.
In addition, he was convicted of disrupting the investigation into the attack. He erased the footage on the security cameras around the terrorist’s home after the attack to prevent the military from getting information about the terrorist and his partners as the terrorist was escaping from the security forces.
Ashraf was subsequently tracked down and killed in January 2019.
Amjad was due to be released next month after serving 12 months in prison. The military prosecution appealed the sentence, and the terrorist appealed against his conviction as well as the severity of his sentence.
Military Court of Appeals Judge Yair Tirosh sharply criticized the decision of the first court, stating that the sentence imposed on the terrorist’s brother did not mirror the severity of the acts.
The judge said that Samaria Military Court did not relate in its sentencing to the period after the attack in which Amjad tried to disrupt the IDF’s actions while knowing that his brother was a dangerous terrorist who was moving freely.
The judge also condemned the terrorist’s arguments in his appeal in which he claimed he was a victim of his brother’s actions and was not guilty.
The court doubled Amjad’s sentence and fined him NIS 70,000.
Haim Blicher, a lawyer from the Honenu rights organization who is accompanying the Leverngrond and Yehezkel families, stated that in the verdict “the court ruled that both the accomplices and those who provided assistance should be severely punished. Let’s hope this will deter the next terrorist’s family.”
“This trend of stricter punishment for terrorists and assistants is undoubtedly the result of a prolonged struggle of bereaved families who come to court discussions, sit with the military prosecutors and urge them to fight terror more and more,” he added.
