The Central District Court in Lod convicted Barkat Abu Issa of Tel Sheva on Monday of rape under aggravated circumstances, burglary, and abuse of a minor, in a case stemming from a February 2023 nighttime attack on a woman in her Gedera home while her young children were present.
According to the verdict, the attacker entered the complainant’s second-floor apartment through the balcony in the early morning hours, overpowered her as she went to check noises from the living room while nursing her toddler, bound her hands, legs, eyes, and mouth with tape, threatened to kill her, and then raped her in the apartment’s safe room. The court said the assault unfolded while her small children were inside the home, with her toddler nearby and crying, and that after the attacker fled, her four-year-old son helped free her with a kitchen knife.
The three-judge panel – retired court president Ruth Lorch, Judge Dvora Atar, and Deputy President Ami Kobo – found the complainant highly credible, describing her testimony as coherent, detailed, consistent, and free of exaggeration. At the same time, the court noted that she could not identify her attacker visually because her eyes had been covered during the assault, making the central issue in the case the identity of the perpetrator.
Identity of attacker confirmed
On that question, the court found that the prosecution had established Abu Issa’s identity beyond a reasonable doubt through a broader circumstantial and forensic evidentiary picture. Among the key pieces of evidence cited were sperm cells from which a DNA profile matching Abu Issa was recovered from the complainant, cellphone location data placing his device in the area, and footage of his vehicle traveling from the south toward the complainant’s area. The court also noted evidence that he worked at a construction site facing the complainant’s home.
Abu Issa denied the charges and claimed he had not been at the scene, arguing that it was a case of mistaken identity, challenging the DNA evidence, and presenting an alibi. But the court rejected his version as unreliable and found that the evidentiary record supported only one conclusion: that he was the man who broke into the apartment and carried out the attack.
The court also convicted him of abusing the complainant’s toddler son, ruling that the child’s exposure to the violence against his mother, and to the fear and helplessness of the scene, met the threshold for that offense. In its summary, the court said the gravity of the acts to which the young child was exposed justified a conviction on that count as well.
In a statement after the ruling, the prosecution said the court had fully accepted its position and had underscored not only the severe harm caused to the complainant, but also the lasting trauma inflicted on a small child exposed to violence against his mother.