Israel detains Palestinian youth over rabbi’s death

By Said al-Amouri

JERUSALEM (AA) – Israel’s internal security service Shabak has detained a Palestinian youth for alleged involvement in the killing of a rabbi in the occupied West Bank last month.

In a statement, Shabak said the suspect, Abdel Hakim Asi, was arrested in a pre-dawn raid in Nablus after an extensive manhunt.
It said a number of people were also taken into custody during the raid.

The rabbi had been stabbed and killed last month near the settlement of Ariel in the West Bank.

There was no reaction from the Palestinian side on the arrest.

Roughly 600,000 Israelis currently live on more than 100 Jewish-only settlements built in the West Bank since Israel occupied the territory -- along with East Jerusalem -- in 1967.

The Palestinians, for their part, want these areas -- along with the Gaza Strip -- for a future state of their own.

International law continues to view the West Bank and East Jerusalem as "occupied territories" and considers all Israeli settlement-building activity on the land as illegal.