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The ‘I Can’t Breathe’ case you never heard of

The ‘I Can’t Breathe’ case you never heard of

Shelly Dadon was murdered because she was Jewish. Her murderer was just sentenced to life in prison.

The death of Eric Garner made famous the phrase “I can’t breathe.” The whole world has heard of Eric Garner.

You probably never heard of Shelly Dadon. Or that she was Israeli. Or that her last words were “I can’t breathe.” Or that she was murdered May 1, 2014, stabbed dozens of times by an Israeli Arab cab driver on her way to a job interview. Because she was Jewish.

We featured Shelly several times in June and July 2014, at a time Israel was gripped by the kidnapping and presumed murder of three Israeli teens (Gil-ad Shaar, Eyal Yifrach and Naftali Fraenkel) and the retaliatory murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir.

On July 6, 2014, we wrote about her murder, Arab Violence Against Israel and Jews Continues:

This case of an Israeli teenager, Shelly Dadon, on way to job interview who was stabbed to death has received almost no international media attention:

Only July 7, 2014, we followed up, Israeli reaction to murder of teen a sign of Israel’s moral strength:

Israel is undergoing intense soul searching, as a nation, for the actions of what are believed to be 6 Israeli Jews in murdering an Israeli Arab teen, Mohammed Abu Khedair, in retaliation for the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens, Gil-ad Shaar, Eyal Yifrach and Naftali Fraenkel….

This reaction from Israeli society is not a sign of weakness, but of strength.

Where was there a similar Palestinian societal soul searching over the murders of the kidnapped teens? Where was the international hand wringing that Palestinian society has gone morally astray?

There will be no such soul searching not just over the murder of the kidnapped Israeli teens, but over the murder of Shelly Dadon (Featured Image).

Dadon, an Israeli Jew, was stabbed to death on May 1 on her way to a job interview in northern Israel. Yesterday the police announced the arrest of an Israeli Arab taxi driver in the crime, which the police believe was driven by “nationalistic” motives, i.e., terrorism.

Yet there is almost no press coverage. As of this writing, a Google News search does not reveal any major non-Israeli newspaper coverage of the arrest in Dadon’s murder.

Shelly Dadon Google News Search 7-7-2014 740 a.m.

During the trial of the accused, the final phone call from Shelly was played, ‘I Can’t Breathe’; Chilling Last Words of Murdered Shelly Dadon

Nazareth District Court this morning heard the chilling last phone call made by Israeli murder victim Shelly Dadon, just moments before she was brutally murdered earlier this year.

Relatives of Danon wept as the recording was heard for the first time during the trial of taxi driver Hussein Khalifa, who stands accused of stabbing the 20-year-old to death in the back of his own taxi.

The following is the transcript of the brief call made by Dadon to her cousin, Tal Peretz.

Dadon: Hello. What’s up? Is everything OK? Where are you?

Peretz: I’m just walking – I’ll call you back soon.

Dadon: One second, listen…

Peretz: When did you leave?

Dadon: Ima’le (Hebrew slang, literally “mummy”), what a scary taxi! I left at a quarter to seven. I can’t breathe…

At that point noises which sound like someone being choked can be heard, and the call eventually cuts off.

You can imagine how her parents reacted when they heard the tape:

https://twitter.com/GolanMay/status/486961881223946240

The killer was just sentenced to life in prison, via Times of Israel:

The Nazareth District Court handed a life sentence to taxi driver Yousef Hussein Halifa on Wednesday and fined him NIS 258,000 (about $65,800) over the murder of Afula resident Shelley Dadon last year in a high-profile case.

In July 2014, the state’s attorney filed charges against Halifa, 37, after he admitted to driving Dadon, 20, on May 1 of that year to the Migdal Haemek industrial center, where she was headed for a job interview, and later stabbing her to death….

Dadon’s murder was deemed by police to have likely been nationalistically motivated. However, the indictment made no mention of motive. Dadon’s parents have insisted that the attack was nationalistically motivated, and called on the police to publicly declare it as such.

“[We] expect that the killer’s home will be demolished just like the home of any other terrorist,” Dadon’s father said Wednesday, referring to a controversial practice implemented by Israeli authorities against families of terrorists. “I wish we had the death penalty, as in any other civilized country,” he added, according to the Ynet news website.

https://twitter.com/ILNewsFlash/status/641546736226410496

How long before Shelly’s murderer is released in a prisoner exchange? Let’s hope never.

Rest in peace, Shelley. Your memory is a blessing.

Shelly Dadon

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Comments

I wonder how many Israeli citizens have to die before the government actually does something about it. These are not criminal acts. And to put a finer point on the whole situation, Israel seems to have no problem swapping hundreds of terrorists for a single captured Israeli yet random Jewish citizens are simply collateral damage because world opinion might be offended.

We should always defend Israel. Part of defending Israel should be our insistence on them making it too expensive for these types of terrorism. But I guess we can’t credibly do that since we don’t care about our citizens enough to do something about the criminal aliens in our midst.

Don’t #JewishLivesMatter? Don’t #AllLivesMatter?

I guess that makes me a H8er to say something like that…

Her murderer was just sentenced to life in prison.

…Which in Israel used to mean he’d get out in about 16 years. Lately the average has gone up to 20 years or so. But in any case he’s likely to be out in the next prisoner exchange, and he surely knew this and counted on it at the time of the murder.

Shelly Danon and Kathryn Steinle still have a voice here at L.I. Thank you Prof. for keeping their faces and stories at the forefront. They represent and convey so much more than the headlines, which followed their murders. By giving your time and space to Kathryn and Shelly as you do, you show the similarities which confronts each of our nations, at home, at our borders and in the world, binding us together, more now than ever before.

Even in Israel Jewish lives are cheap when they are taken by Arabs. “Life in Prison” for murdering Jews in Israel is often a rhetorical point. The odds are he’ll be released w/o parole in 10 years only to be re arrested again for killing, raping or maiming someone else. And if god forbid she was an American no one would be tried at all and civil suit in this country would be blocked by Obama.

The charges avoided using any such labels specifically so that this piece of trash would hopefully never be included in some bull stink political “hostage exchange”. In hopes that no Muslims kidnap some other poor Israelis to get this murderer back and make him a hero.

    Milhouse in reply to SeanInLI. | September 11, 2015 at 2:04 am

    How does avoiding specific labels mean that he won’t be included in the next exchange? Do you imagine that the Arabs care what labels the Israeli authorities put on him? They know who he is, and when they present their next list of prisoners whose freedom they demand, his name will be on it.

Mark my words. Sooner than later Israel will reinstate the death penalty for these type of crimes. The abolishment of the death penalty was done when leftists controlled Israel. That’s far from the case now. However one should understand that Israel’s court system is still controlled by leftist attorneys and leftist judges. Jacobson should write a column or two about this phenomenon.

    Milhouse in reply to faboutlaws. | September 11, 2015 at 2:08 am

    Israel has not abolished the death penalty. It’s just never used it, except for Eichmann. Military tribunals have the power to impose death for terrorist acts, they just never do.

    And yes, the Israeli legal system is not only controlled by the hard left, but it has effectively taken over the entire government. Elections no longer mean very much, because the elected government is required to act on the advice of its “legal advisers” who are appointed by the leftist clique, much in the same way that the Queen is required to act on the advice of her ministers who are chosen by Parliament.