Fogel Family Murders

This story is unbearably sad.

Aaron Klein reports on the brutal murders of five members of the Fogel family in the Jewish village of Itamar.

He writes that terror cells from the Palestinian Authority's military wing were involved.

The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the "military wing" of PA President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party, at first released a pamphlet taking responsibility for the attack and then quickly retracted the statement.

Top sources in the Brigades leadership in the northern West Bank city of Nablus, however, confirmed to WND that members of the Fatah group planned and helped to carry out the attack.

The sources claimed the attack was not sanctioned by the Fatah leadership but was planned by Brigades members who were acting as individuals.

Also, the sources said the actual perpetrators of the attack were sleeper cells from Hamas, while the Brigades leaders planned the attack, provided logistical support and aided in the Hamas agents' escape.

If accurate, this would evidence unusual cooperation between Hamas and Fatah rivals.

The details of the slaughter are very difficult to read.

Yesterday's massacre, in the northern West Bank village of Itamer, saw Palestinian assailants stab to death the Fogel family – father Udi, 37, mother Ruth, 36, 10-year-old Yoav, 4-year-old Elad, and 3-month-old Hadas – inside their home. Two other children in the house at the time were not hurt in the attack, apparently because the terrorists did not notice them.

Israel National News reported the initial findings of the investigation show the terrorists stabbed the Fogel family's sleeping 3-year-old in the heart and slashed the throat of his 3-month-old sister.

The assailants apparently entered the Fogel's home through a living room window. They did not notice a 6-year-old boy sleeping on the couch and continued on to the bedroom, where they slashed the throats of the father and newborn baby sleeping there.

The mother, Ruth, came out of the bathroom and was stabbed in the doorway. The evidence shows she tried to fight the terrorists.

The Palestinians found 10-year old Yoav reading in bed when they stabbed him to death.

They apparently also did not notice a 2-year old asleep in his bed, but murdered the 3-year old with two stabs to his heart.

After that, the terrorists reportedly locked the door of the house and exited through the window.

The Fogel's 12-year-old daughter returned home only to find the horrific scene. She reportedly ran out of the house screaming.

According to reports, she was not able to initially enter the locked house so she woke up a neighbor, who assisted her in waking up one of the sleeping children inside the Fogel home who had had not been noticed by the terrorists.

This is absolutely horrific.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas claims to agree. After prompting by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Abbas condemned the attack.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Monday the killing of a Jewish settler couple and three of their children was "inhuman," telling Israel he was determined to help catch those responsible.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had complained that Abbas's administration insufficiently condemned the attack and even encouraged such bloodshed through "incitement" in official Palestinian forums.

"This was inhuman and immoral. We deplore this incident, without a doubt. It is an abomination," Abbas told Israel Radio.

"I can't imagine a four-month-old child murdered," he said, speaking in Arabic. "Children, of all things ... Any person who has a sense of humanity would be pained and driven to tears by such sights."

My prayers are with the surviving children of the Fogel family.

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WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT