State prosecutors appealed to the Supreme Court on Monday to toughen the prison terms of six Lod residents and a Palestinian from the West Bank convicted in the 2021 lynching of Yigal Yehoshua, who died after he was hit in the head with a stone during nationwide unrest that coincided with Israel’s Guardian of the Walls campaign in Gaza.
Prosecutors said the sentences of 12 to 14 years handed down in September by the Central District Court in Lod do not reflect the severity of the attack, the fatal injuries caused to Yehoshua and the incident’s clear terrorist and racist characteristics.
Yehoshua, a 56-year-old Lod resident known for promoting coexistence in the mixed city, was driving home when the defendants identified him as Jewish and hurled stones at his car. One stone broke through his windshield and struck his head, causing a severe brain injury and a skull fracture. He died several days later.
Seven defendants were convicted of committing an aggravated intentional injury as a terrorist act. An eighth was convicted of a separate terrorism offense.
In their ruling, the district court judges noted that unrest earlier that night involving Jewish rioters served as a trigger and said the defendants’ actions were not premeditated. “The days of Guardian of the Walls were days of riots, disorder and blocked roads, while the entire country was burning from within and from without,” the presiding judge wrote.
Fourteen years were imposed on Khaled Hassouna; 13 and a half years on Ahmad Danon; 13 years on Yosef Kadaim, Walid Kadaim, Karim Bahlul and Kamel Allah; and 12 years on Iyad Marahala. All were ordered to pay Yehoshua’s family 900,000 shekels. Muhammad Hassouna, who joined the attack to throw stones, was sentenced to three years.
Prosecutors had originally sought sentences of 18 to 22 years.
In their appeal, state prosecutors said the attack was “one of the most serious events” during the 2021 unrest and argued the court did not give enough weight to the timing of the offenses, which occurred during days of violent clashes and nationalist rioting across Israel.
They said the group used a burning barricade to distinguish between Jewish and Arab vehicles and targeted only Jewish drivers. Even after realizing Yehoshua was gravely wounded, prosecutors said, the attackers did not help him and instead tried to obstruct the investigation by disabling security cameras.
The appeal argued that the lynching, carried out by Israeli citizens against another Israeli during a military campaign, “was seared into Israeli public memory” and warranted harsher punishment to ensure deterrence.
Prosecutors added that Yehoshua, who lived and worked alongside both Jews and Arabs, “was killed in a brutal act of terror because of his identity,” and said his family continues to bear deep pain.