The IDF cleared for release that security forces arrested three terrorists who attacked a vehicle near the Jewish community of Beit El on October 24, 2015.
The three attackers are accused of hurling two firebombs (Molotov cocktails) at the car in which the Sofer family was traveling with their children. The seat in which their three-year-old daughter Tahel was fastened was struck by one of the firebombs.
It immediately ignited.
Tahel’s parents managed to stop the car, pull everyone out, tear off the little girl’s clothing and put out the fire, just as rescue teams arrived. Little Tahel suffered burns on at least 35 percent of her body.
The Sofer family had been driving on Highway 60 just before the start of the Sabbath when the firebombs were hurled at their car. The parents and two children were burned. The victims were rushed to Hadassah Ein Kerem Medical Center in Jerusalem.
“The attack was one of several pre-planned attacks targeting Israelis in the area,” the IDF said in a statement. It was carried out during the start of a wave of terror that included stoning, stabbing, firebombing, shooting and suicide terror attacks, and which continued for a number of months.
The three Palestinian Authority terrorists had been out “celebrating” another ‘Day of Rage’ on the Friday they carried out their attack.
Earlier that week, the United Nations Education, Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) had declared the site of the Tomb of Rachel — the ancient Biblical Matriarch of the three monotheistic faiths – to be solely a Muslim site, though it existed long before the founding of Islam.
A year later – in the latter half of October 2016 – UNESCO did the same with Jerusalem and the Jewish faith, effectively erasing all links between the Jewish People and Jerusalem, naming all her sacred sites solely by their Islamic names. The Temple Mount — site of the Jewish Holy Temple – also the location of the Al Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock, and the Western Wall, the sole remnant of the retaining wall of the Second Holy Temple, are referred to in the recent UNESCO Executive Board resolution on Jerusalem only by their Muslim names.
The holy city of Jerusalem is stripped of her glory in Judaism and Christianity by UNESCO, as was Rachel’s Tomb the year before.
How fortunate that reality has so little to do with UNESCO pronouncements.