On April 30, 2003, laborers from the Village of Tayasir were returning by bus to their village in the Jenin District at the end of their work day in Kibbutz Beit HaArava. The bus stopped at a military checkpoint on Route 90. Because of the long wait, the laborers got off the bus. Two of them walked towards the greenhouses near the road, about 100 meters away from the bus, in order to relieve themselves.
At that moment, driving along Route 90, Shlomo Adir, the security officer of the Petza'el settlement, spotted the two laborers in the greenhouses area. Suspecting they were thieves, Adir approached the group of laborers waiting by the bus and asked if they had seen anyone near the greenhouses. The laborers clarified these were two fellow laborers. Adir drove into the greenhouses area, using the vehicle's public speaker system called out to the laborers to stop, then got out of the vehicle, cocked his weapon, and fired ten shots in the air. At the next moment, Adir noticed one of the laborers was near him and shot him three times at close range, the bullets hit his upper body, and he died instantly.
During interrogation, Adir gave several versions explaining the fatal shooting. First, that he suspected they were thieves and so started in pursuit; later on, he claimed that he suspected the man to be a terrorist – as the laborer "wore camouflage pants" – and so opened fire; finally, that he continued firing at close range, fearing the deceased had an explosive device on his person.
On July 24, 2003, HaMoked appealed to the Military Legal Advisor for the West Bank and the Military Advocate of the Central Command, to open an inquiry and bring the shooter to justice. Two years later, after a lengthy correspondence,
HaMoked received brief notice of the decision of the Jerusalem district attorney to close the case due to insufficient evidence.
HaMoked appealed against this decision and on August 23, 2006, the State Attorney accepted the appeal and
ordered to try Shlomo Adir for negligent homicide.
In January 2007, the deceased's family filed a
civil claim via HaMoked against Shlomo Adir and the Petza'el settlement. The plaintiffs contended that the father of the family had been innocently killed and that that defendants were accountable for the resultant damage the family incurred.
In March 2008, the magistrates'
court found Adir guilty of negligent homicide, and sentenced him to 200 hours community service, a suspended prison sentence and payment of compensation to the victim's family in the sum of NIS 25,000. The judge ruled that Adir had hastily and recklessly initiated the "suspect arrest procedure", and hastily and recklessly ended it with fatal shooting. Adir's appeals to the District Court and the Supreme Court were denied.
On November 25, 2010, seven and a half years after the fatal and unnecessary shooting, the parties reached a
settlement – endorsed by the court – whereby the shooter and the Petza'el settlement will pay the victim's family a total of NIS 763,670 in compensation.
