Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Parents Of Palestinian Teen Burned Alive Sue Jewish Killers For $1.5 Million

JERUSALEM (JTA) — The family of a Palestinian teen burned to death in a revenge attack by three Jewish extremists is suing his killers in a civil lawsuit.

The parents of Mohammed Abu Khdeir are seeing $1.5 million in damages.

The criminal case against the three Jewish extremists, including two minors, ended earlier this year after all of their appeals were exhausted, clearing the way for the civil lawsuit.

According to the lawsuit filed Tuesday, “There is no doubt there is no adequate compensation for such a needless and outrageous loss of a young man’s life. This was done with the respondents’ malicious intent to harm the deceased. They displayed indifference and cynicism in the face of the most horrible outcome of all — the death of the deceased in suffering and agony. They also did not spare the parents of the deceased, who were left with nothing after the death of their son.”

Abu Khdeir’s charred body was discovered in the Jerusalem Forest hours after the bodies of three kidnapped Jewish teens were discovered near Hebron.

In May 2016, Yosef Ben-David, 31, of Jerusalem, was sentenced to life in prison plus 20 years.

The names of Ben-David’s accomplices, who were both 16 at the time of the killing, have not been released publicly. The accomplices were sentenced in April 2016: one to life in prison, the other to 21 years.

Following their sentencing, the Khdeir family asked Israel’s Supreme Court to order the demolition of the murderers’ homes, as the Israeli army does when a Palestinian terrorist is caught. The court rejected the request, saying too much time had elapsed between the attack and the demolition request.

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.

In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.

At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.

Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we need 500 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.

Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly. 

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Our Goal: 500 gifts during our Passover Pledge Drive!

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.