An Israeli soldier was convicted yesterday of the manslaughter of a British pro-Palestinian activist, Tom Hurndall, in the Gaza strip after a two-year battle for justice by his parents.
Sergeant Idier Wahid Taysir faces up to 20 years in prison for shooting Mr Hurndall as he shepherded children to safety from gunfire in Rafah refugee camp in April 2003 and for lying to army investigators about the circumstances. Mr Hurndall died in London nine months after the shooting.
His father, Anthony, welcomed the verdict but said that Sgt Taysir's superior officers should also be held to account for a military policy that "encourages soldiers to shoot civilians" and is "part of a culture of impunity in Israel".
"I think that he is a scapegoat, a pawn in the larger system. He was laid at the sacrificial altar of Israeli policy," he said. "There seems to be a tacit policy in place that shooting Palestinians is, in some way, fair game."
Sgt Taysir, a member of the Bedouin Arab minority, is only the third Israeli soldier convicted of illegal killing even though human rights groups say many more are guilty in the deaths of more than 1,700 Palestinian civilians, one third of them children, since the beginning of the intifada nearly five years ago. The Israeli army's first investigation backed Sgt Taysir's claim that Mr Hurndall was wearing camouflage and carrying a gun when he was shot.
But the military was forced to reopen the investigation after the Hurndalls' own inquiry disproved many of the army's claims. Photographs of Mr Hurndall immediately after he was shot showed he was wearing a bright orange jacket favoured by pro-Palestinian foreign activists.
The judges yesterday described Sgt Taysir's version of the shooting as "confused and even pathetic".
Outside the military court, Anthony Hurndall, a solicitor, said the killing of his son would have remained covered up because of "obstruction" by the Israeli authorities, had he not had the resources to investigate and to win British diplo matic support. "It has only come about because we are a British family, we have a very powerful and strong influence exerted on the Israel government through our own Foreign Office and embassy here, and the fact that we had put together our own case, collected the evidence, and proved to the Israeli government that this was indeed a crime," he said.
"Despite our requests, we have not seen all the evidence, and we believe this may go much further up the chain."
The Israeli military prosecutor, Captain Hilla Gorni, denied that there was a wider responsibility for Tom Hurndall's death. "This soldier acted on his own without any authority, without reporting to anyone. His actions after the shooting shows he was doing something wrong and not anything that would be accepted by his commanding officer," she said.
The Israeli authorities further angered Mr Hurndall yesterday after they arrested another of his sons, Billy, on the grounds that he was a security threat and refused to allow him to enter the country to hear the verdict. Sgt Taysir will be sentenced next month and as he left the court he lashed out at journalists, attempting to punch cameramen with the encouragement of the military police escorting him.