TEL AVIV – The Palestinian suspect in the brutal rape and murder of Israeli teen Ori Ansbacher was indicted Thursday at the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court.
Arafat Irfaiya, 29, from the West Bank town of Hebron, was charged with rape and murder as an act of terror. His victim, 19-year-old Ori Ansbacher, was taking a walk in a forest in southern Jerusalem at the time when Irfaiya viciously attacked her after crossing illegally into Israel with the intent of murdering someone in revenge for Israel’s alleged mistreatment of Palestinians, the indictment said.
“He came across Ansbacher and decided to kill her because she was Jewish,” the indictment said. “He attacked Ori with violent cruelty, and though she tried to fight him off, he overpowered her. He stabbed her with a knife multiple times throughout her body, causing her death.”
The rest of the grisly details of the murder-rape remain under gag order, the court said.
Irfaiya will remain in custody until March 17.
Last month, the Shin Bet security agency deemed the rape and murder to be a nationalistically motivated terror attack.
Irfaiya confessed to the murder, saying he had purposely entered Israel to find a Jewish victim to kill because he wanted to be a “martyr.”
“I entered Israel with a knife because I wanted to become a martyr and murder a Jew,” Irfaiya said.
“I met the girl by chance,” he said and added that he broke into a run after crossing the so-called Green Line in order to avoid being detected by security cameras. He also told interrogators that he had no plan and the only preparations he made were to procure a yarmulke to infiltrate Israel undetected.
Irfaiya said he saw Ansbacher, a volunteer at a youth center, sitting on a rock and writing in her notebook, and decided he would have sex with her “whether she agreed to it, or not.”
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