Islamic cleric call to kill Jews sentenced – 8 months in jail for fiery sermon

This news has been read 6294 times!

JERUSALEM, Sept 25, (AFP): An Israeli court on Sunday sentenced a Palestinian Islamic preacher to eight months in prison over a sermon at a volatile Jerusalem holy site in which he called for Jews to be killed.

The Jerusalem magistrates’ court had in March found Sheikh Omar Abu Sara, 51, guilty of incitement to violence and racism in a sermon he delivered at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound. In his November 28, 2014 sermon, which was also uploaded to YouTube, Abu Sara said “the Jews” were treacherous, stubborn, murderous, rude and shameless. “I’m telling Jews explicitly — it’s time to slaughter you, time to fight you, time to kill you,” he said, according to a transcript of the speech in the court decision. He vowed Muslims will “free this land from your filth, and that day is approaching.”

The sermon came against the backdrop of months of unrest over perceived Jewish attempts to take control over the holy site, which Jews refer to as the Temple Mount and consider their most sacred. There were also tensions over the murder of a Palestinian teenager in July in revenge for the killings of three Jewish teenagers in the West Bank.

The killings were part of a cycle of violence that led up to the 2014 war between Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza. Abu Sara claimed the sermon should not be considered incitement to violence and racism since it was based on religious scriptures and teachings and contained “general and non-binding” statements, the decision said.

But the court rejected that argument, noting most of the sermon was not quotes but original statements by Abu Sara, who “sought to humiliate and degrade Jews” and “preach Jew-hatred to the other worshippers”. The Islamic Waqf organisation, which administers the Al-Aqsa compound, the third-holiest site in Islam, told AFP it as not aware of a preacher there by that name.

This news has been read 6294 times!