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Palestinian car vandalized in an alleged 'price tag' attack, West Bank, Jan. 8, 2014. Photo by AP

Havat Gilad men charged with setting alight two vehicles and spray painting Star of David in Palestinian village late last year.

By Chaim Levinson for Haaretz



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Three settlers first to be charged in 'unprovoked' anti-Arab attack
Havat Gilad men charged with setting alight two vehicles and spray painting Star of David in Palestinian village late last year.
By Chaim Levinson | Feb. 5, 2014 | 3:50 PM

local Palestinian car vandalized in an alleged 'price tag' attack, West Bank.
Palestinian car vandalized in an alleged 'price tag' attack, West Bank, Jan. 8, 2014. Photo by AP
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Three settlers were charged Thursday with taking part in an anti-Arab attack late last year, marking the first indictment for so-called "price tag" attacks that did not come in response to a settlement evacuation.

The three men, all from the West Bank outpost of Havat Gilad and in their 20s, were charged with setting alight a car and truck and spray painting a Star of David on a wall in the Palestinian village of Farata in the northern West Bank in November.

"The incident demonstrates the potential threat in Judea and Samaria and embodied in the activity of a small group of right-wing extremists who use violent and forbidden activity in order to implement their ideological desires," the Shin Bet security service said in a statement.

Dozens of Israelis have previously been charged in "price tag" cases, which radical settlers have said are revenge attacks – whether vandalism or assault – on Palestinians, Israeli security forces or left-wing activists. But this is the first time indictments have been issued against any of the 52 Israelis who are suspected of committing anti-Arab attacks since 2011 that do not come in response to a settlement evacuation, or other such incident that extremist settlers consider a provocation. Law-enforcement authorities consider the latter a separate category they call "covert price tag."

Yehuda Lansberg, Yehuda Savir and Binyamin Richter are also charged with racist incitement, conspiring to commit a crime and defacing property.

Lansberg and Savir have both admitted to the charges, but their lawyer said they were subject to undue pressure and abuse under interrogation.

"Security forces misled the courts by attributing security offenses to them, thus preventing them from exercising the basic right of meeting with a lawyer," said Adi Kedar, the attorney for all three suspects. Kedar is a lawyer for Honenu, a legal aid organization that assists Jews arrested over "defending themselves against Arab aggression, or due to their love for Israel."

Richter was indicted in May on charges of assaulting a Palestinian man and his daughter for racist motives. Police say he approached the father and daughter at a bus station near the West Bank settlement of Karnei Shomron and beat the man until he collapsed on the ground, after telling the girl: "You're an Arab, get out of here." He is also suspected of pushing, kicking and cursing out the girl. He was detained and released to house arrest.

Binyamin Richter is a son of former Los Angeles resident Yehuda Richter, who in 1984 was sentenced to five years in jail for opening fire on a Palestinian bus and wounding seven passengers.