Security minister to set conditions for return of terrorists' bodies
Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan is pushing legislation that would prevent incitement at the funerals of terrorists.
By UDI SHAHAMRelatives and friends carry the coffin of Youssef Othman, one of three guards killed in yesterday’s terrorist attack, during his funeral in Abu Ghosh.(photo credit: RONEN ZVULUN / REUTERS)
Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan announced on Sunday his intentions to promote legislation that will allow the police to set conditions for terrorists’ funerals, and not return their bodies until their families abide by them.The suggested measure, submitted by MK Bezalel Smotrich (Bayit Yehudi) and MK Anat Berko (Likud), aims to combat the phenomenon of incitement that is often found at the funerals of terrorists. In order to do so, is it suggested that the police will have right to decide when the bodies of terrorists are given back to their families, and only after the families agree to the police’s terms of the funeral.“In recent years we have witnessed an increasing phenomenon in which after a terrorist attack, we see acts of incitement, encouragement and support of the attack,” read a statement sent by Erdan’s office on Sunday.“We especially see these kinds of acts in the terrorists’ funerals. Not once we have seen there people holding signs and heard speeches and calls in support of terrorist attacks, or calling to take action to carry out further attacks,” the statement reads.Erdan has voiced numerous times his objection against handing back terrorists’ bodies automatically to their families. After the Temple Mount attack in July, in which two Israeli policemen were killed, Erdan backed the police's stance to set conditions to the Umm al-Fahm families to receive terrorists’ bodies.The suggested legislation intends to amend the current situation in light of past rulings of the High Court of Justice, that said in several occasions that bodies of terrorists should be returned to their families for burial, while police and other authorities held the opposite position.Erdan said on Sunday that his duty as Public Security Minister is to prevent funerals from becoming a stage of incident.“These kind of funerals are making people to go our and carry out attacks,” he said. “We’ve seen it in the mass funeral of the terrorists in Umm al-Fahm. [From now on] terrorists[ funerals will be carried out only after [the families] will abide the conditions that were set by police,” he said.
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