Students at Oxford University’s famed debating society sparked outrage this week after displaying red-painted hands — a gesture symbolizing the 2000 Ramallah lynching, when a Palestinian mob brutally murdered two Israeli soldiers, and one attacker, Abdel Aziz Salha, held his bloodied hands aloft from a window.
The incident occurred during the visit of an Israeli guest speaker to the Oxford Union. Witnesses said several students raised their hands covered in red paint, referencing the infamous image of Salha, the Palestinian terrorist who strangled one of the reservists and then displayed his blood-soaked palms to a cheering crowd.
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Oxford Union students mimic Ramallah lynching gesture
(Photo: Screenshot from social media)
On October 12, 2000, IDF reservists Cpl. Vadim Nurzhitz and Cpl. Yosef Avrahami mistakenly entered Ramallah, where they were seized by Palestinian police and dragged into the Al-Bireh station.
A mob stormed the building, beating the two men to death and mutilating their bodies before throwing them out the window. Salha, who later admitted to the murder, was convicted in 2004 and sentenced to life in prison, but released in 2011 as part of the Gilad Shalit deal.
Arab media reported last year that Salha was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza. His image — hands dripping with Israeli blood — has long been celebrated in Palestinian propaganda and has become a symbol of violence against Jews.
The Oxford Union has not yet issued a public statement.