Killing of Palestinian Youth Puts an Israeli Focus on Extremism

By STEVEN ERLANGER, NYT
JULY 10, 2014

JERUSALEM — Even as the Israeli public offers strong support for airstrikes on Hamas fighters and their weapons stocks in Gaza, there is a good deal of reflection over the coldblooded killing of a Palestinian teenager that helped lead to the latest increase in violence.

Brutality against innocents is not new on either side of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But, despite a court order that bans the disclosure of information in the case, Israelis have been discussing links between the suspects arrested in the killing of the teenager, Muhammad Abu Khdeir, and Israeli right-wing extremist groups that have at times operated with impunity.

Very little about the six suspects has been confirmed, because of the court order. But several Israeli media outlets have linked them to extremist groups, describing them as “shababnikkim,” pejorative Hebrew slang for right-wing extremist youth from ultra-Orthodox homes on the fringes of Orthodox society.

(More here.)