And again: Palestinian worker-turned-terrorist murders two Israeli co-workers

Kim Levengrond-Yehezkel, 29, of Rosh HaAyin; and Ziv Hajbi, 32, of Rishon LeZion, murdered by a Palestinian terrorist in Barkan

Yesterday morning a Palestinian employee of a factory in Barkan, Samaria, turned on his fellow workers and killed two of them.

The two victims, Kim Levengrond-Yehezkel Hy’d and Ziv Hajbi Hy’d were remembered by their friends:

The victims of Sunday’s terror attack at a factory in the Barkan industrial area near the West Bank city of Ariel have been identified as Kim Levengrond-Yehezkel, 29, of Rosh HaAyin; and Ziv Hajbi, 35, of Rishon LeZion.

Hebrew news site Walla reported that Levengrond-Yehezkel had worked at the factory for a year as secretary to the vice-president of the company. She is survived by her husband and one-and-a-half year old son. She was a law student who was working in preparation for her exams.

A family friend described her as “smiling and good-hearted” on the day of her death. “We haven’t absorbed the heavy tragedy,” the friend added, “the skies have fallen on us.”

One can hardly imagine the devastation of Kim’s family. Her baby son will never know his mother or remember her. Her husband will have to become father and mother to his son. The nation of Israel has lost a warm and loving mother and friend and her loss is unbearable.

The second victim, Ziv Hajbi:

Hajbi was about to celebrate his birthday on Friday and leaves behind a wife and three children — seven-year-old twins and a four-year-old son. Benny, a friend of his, told Walla that when he heard of the attack at Barkan he desperately sent text messages to Hajbi, but “he didn’t answer. I asked him, ‘Ziv, is everything ok?’ He didn’t answer. His wife cried over the telephone.”

“He was easy going,” Benny described his friend, “quiet, respectful, never harmed anyone, a good father, a good husband, an exemplary family man. He had amazing patience with children, modest … I would say to him, ‘Why do you have to make these trips to Samaria?’ He didn’t think it was a dangerous area.”

Another close friend of Hajbi, Assaf Dabul, noted two tragic coincidences, saying, “I was invited in two weeks to the widow’s brother’s wedding, I don’t know if it will take place.” Dabul also noted that Hajbi was planning to leave his job, wondering, “Who knows if he had left, maybe this wouldn’t have happened to him.”

“Ziv was a wonderful man,” he added. “A golden boy, a magnificent father, a terrific man.”

Here too, a warm and loving father and worker, murdered in cold blood, leaving a devastated family, little children who will grow up without their father, and a widow left on her own. Ziv’s loss is a tragedy for the family and the nation.

May their families be comforted amongst the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem and may Hashem avenge their blood.

May their memories be for a blessing. יהי זכרם ברוך.

Returning to the dreadful events of yesterday in Barkan, eyewitnesses described the scene. Please note the terrorist did not “just” open fire randomly. He picked out the victims and tied them up first, execution-style. This was a cold blooded vicious murder of innocent people whose only crime was being Israeli:

Eyewitnesses to Sunday’s terror attack at a factory in the Barkan industrial area near the West Bank city of Ariel described the scene to the Israeli media, including a man who fired at the fleeing suspect.

The attack took place early on Sunday morning at the Alon Group factory. The terrorist, armed with a homemade weapon, tied up a man and a woman and killed them execution-style. He then fired at another woman, who was moderately wounded but is expected to survive. The terrorist then fled the scene of the crime.

The suspect worked in the factory where the attack took place and has been identified by the security services, though he has not yet been publicly named. A manhunt is underway.

“I saw him run quickly toward the street and he fired in my direction,” Yogav Fried, who encountered the suspect moments after the shooting, told Israel’s Channel 2. Fried returned fire, saying, “I fired one bullet at him and he disappeared.”

“The Palestinian came to the warehouse that is separated from the offices,” Fried added. “The Palestinian workers shouted that something had happened, so we ran to the floor to see what happened. The moment we saw one of the wounded lying with a bullet wound, we understood that we were talking about a terrorist attack. I drew my gun and searched everywhere.”

“I went room by room and office by office,” Fried continued, but could not locate the terrorist. “When I went out to the street opposite, he came up from behind me, I saw him escape toward the street below. He managed to aim his gun at me, shot a single bullet. I was able to return fire in his direction in a millisecond, and he disappeared from my sight.”

Lest anyone think this was a mere workplace incident, read these words of one of the other workers:

Smadar Leitenberg, a worker at the factory, told Channel 2 that the victims were “friends of mine who worked in financial management.” She rejected the notion that the incident may have been a case of workplace violence, saying she is convinced that the terrorist’s motive “was purely nationalist.”

“There is no connection to layoffs or to anything,” she said. “My boss always said that everyone he employed was one less terrorist,” noting that the factory employs many Palestinian workers.

“The Palestinian workers are like our family,” she added. “The boss was always with them and supported them, and it’s hard to believe that one of them did this.”

The end result of such incidents is that innocent Palestinians suffer as much as Israelis, as we lose our trust in them and people think twice before employing them.

This suspicion is borne out by many other such workplace terror attacks where Palestinian employees turn on their employers and colleagues. Their frequency makes us severely doubt the possibility of there ever being real peace between the two. If you would like a list of such Palestinian terror attacks “in the workplace” read this post from Sheri Oz and read through the comments There are dozens if not hundreds of incidents. It makes me sick to the stomach.

Here are just a few examples:

• Construction worker’s fall was deliberate as his rappelling ropes were cut by Arab co-worker
• Arab workers murder their employer in Kfar Kassem
• Palestinian murders his employer in Atarot

You get the picture.

The IDF have now named the despicable terrorist as as Ashraf Walid Suleiman Na’alowa, 23, of Shuweika.

The Israeli army on Sunday named the Palestinian man suspected of carrying out a deadly terror attack in the northern West Bank as Ashraf Walid Suleiman Na’alowa, 23, as troops continued to hunt for him after he shot and killed two Israelis and wounded a third earlier in the day.

Members of Na’alowa’s family and others were arrested by the Israel Defense Forces and interrogated by the Shin Bet security service to determine if they assisted him in the terror attack or in his escape from the scene, the army said.

“IDF troops went to the terrorist’s home in the village of Shuweika in the Menashe regional brigade’s jurisdiction, measured his home [ahead of eventual demolition] and conducted interrogations and arrests of people suspected of assisting the terrorist,” the army said.

…

The military launched an investigation of the attack to determine, among other things, how the gun was smuggled into the industrial park and whether the terrorist intended to take Levengrond Yehezkel hostage, having used zip-ties to bind her hands.

Levengrond Yehezkel was secretary to the CEO, while Hajbi worked in accounting. Na’alowa was employed at Alon Group as an electrician.

Na’alowa fled the scene of the attack, prompting a large-scale manhunt, in which IDF troops set up road closures and checkpoints throughout the area, including at the entrances to some Palestinian towns in the northern West Bank. IDF special forces, including the Oketz K-9 unit, took part in the searches.

…

According to the IDF, Na’alowa had no history of terrorist activities and was not tied to any terror groups, though several of them applauded his actions.

Earlier in the day, he had posted on his Facebook page that he was “waiting for [Allah].” He had also left a suicide letter with a friend three days ago, according to a television report.

When “regular” people sadly commit suicide they don’t normally go to their workplace, tie people up and then shoot them. This was not the work of a regular suicide. This was a jihadist determined to kill Jews.

And the difference between us – Israelis – and them – Palestinians?

The families of Levengrond Yehezkel and Hajbi both said they would donate their organs.

The businesses in the Barkan Industrial Park, located near Ariel, employ some 8,000 people, approximately half of them Israelis and the other half Palestinians.

It has been repeatedly claimed that when the Palestinians feel they have something to lose they will stop their terror attacks. Attacks such as yesterday’s in a place such as Barkan puts the lie to this theory.

It is the incitement of political Islam that is the driving force behind such attacks. Until the leaders are expelled or otherwise neutralized, we will never see the end of it.