[JP] The Lod District Court on Monday sentenced Amiram Ben Uliel to multiple life sentences based on his conviction in the terror arson murders of the Palestinian Dawabshe family.The July 2015 attack killed 18-month-old Ali and his parents, Sa’ad and Riham, and destabilized Israeli-Arab relations throughout the region.
Ben Uliel was convicted by the court on May 18, and the court dismissed an unusual final attempt last week to overturn the verdict based on new evidence.
The defense has vowed to appeal to the Supreme Court saying the district court wrongfully accepted some of Ben Uliel’s confessions given post alleged torture by the Shin Bet.
Ben Uliel’s legal team, led by Asher Ohayon, had asked for leniency, but given a triple murder conviction was pessimistic going into Monday’s hearing.
In May, judges Ruth Lorch, Tsvi Dotan and Dvora Atar also convicted Ben-Uliel of two separate counts of attempted murder and two separate counts of arson, but acquitted Ben-Uliel of membership in a terror group.
Despite that acquittal, the court also declared that Ben-Uliel had murdered the Palestinians for ideological reasons — something that could lead to a harsher sentence or to preventing lenient treatment at some later date.
The court said that even though it disqualified confessions Ben-Uliel gave when the Shin Bet used enhanced interrogation on him, his confessions 36 hours later were given freely and compellingly.