Asher Weisgan was an Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

i bus driver who shot and murdered four Palestinians and injured two others in the Israeli settlement

Israeli settlement

An Israeli settlement is a Jewish civilian community built on land that was captured by Israel from Jordan, Egypt, and Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War and is considered occupied territory by the international community. Such settlements currently exist in the West Bank...

 of Shiloh in the West Bank

West Bank

The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...

 on 17 August 2005. Weisgan wanted to disrupt the Israeli Government's unilateral disengagement plan

Israel's unilateral disengagement plan

Israel's unilateral disengagement plan , also known as the "Disengagement plan", "Gaza expulsion plan", and "Hitnatkut", was a proposal by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, adopted by the government on June 6, 2004 and enacted in August 2005, to evict all Israelis from the Gaza Strip and from...

 in Gaza

Gaza

Gaza , also referred to as Gaza City, is a Palestinian city in the Gaza Strip, with a population of about 450,000, making it the largest city in the Palestinian territories.Inhabited since at least the 15th century BC,...

 by sparking a Palestinian reaction. On 27 September 2006, Weisgan was sentenced by the Israeli court to four consecutive terms of life in prison, for each person he killed, and an additional twelve years in jail. Later that year, he committed suicide by hanging himself in prison.

Victims

Weisgan, who lived in the Israeli settlement of Shvut Rachel

Shvut Rachel

Shvut Rachel is an Israeli settlement and a city in the West Bank, located 30 miles north of Jerusalem. Shvut Rachel is located in the Shiloh area in Binyamin. Nearby Israeli settlements include Shilo, Giv'at Har'el, Esh Kodesh, Keeda, and Adei Ad. The village, administrated by the Matte Binyamin...

, had known two of his targets, Bassam and Usama Tawafsha from the neighbouring Palestinian hillside village of Sanjal, for eight years. The shooting rampage, executed with premeditation and in cold blood, according to the court, occurred while he was giving both them and another victim a lift home from work. He stole a security guard's gun and opened fire, shooting four Palestinians several times, and then reloading to seek out and shoot a fifth victim at his work-place. After the killing spree he either turned himself in to, or was overpowered by, security guards at the settlement. The names of his victims were Khalil Muhammad Ra'uf Saleh Wleiwel, Ahmad 'Ali Hassan Mansur, Bassam Mussa Ahmad 'Odeh Tawafshah, and Osama Mussa Ahmad 'Odeh Tawafshah

In the aftermath, Usama's wife Aisha called for revenge against Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

, the settlers and the then Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon

Ariel Sharon

Ariel Sharon is an Israeli statesman and retired general, who served as Israel’s 11th Prime Minister. He has been in a permanent vegetative state since suffering a stroke on 4 January 2006....

, saying,

'When one of them kills us they say he is crazy, but if an Arab does that to a settler the whole world is up in arms saying he's a terrorist. They had worked with him (Weisgan) for eight years. They used to say how decent he was, how they used to eat together, how he used to ask them for our food to take to his wife.'

Weisgan worked as a bus-driver, transporting Palestinian labourers to the Shvut Rachel settlement's aluminum factory, where the victims were employed. The Haaretz

Haaretz

Haaretz is Israel's oldest daily newspaper. It was founded in 1918 and is now published in both Hebrew and English in Berliner format. The English edition is published and sold together with the International Herald Tribune. Both Hebrew and English editions can be read on the Internet...

newspaper quoted Weisgan having declared, before entering a courthouse outside of Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...

, 'I'm not sorry for what I did. I hope someone also kills Sharon.'

Sentencing

On 27 September 2006, a panel of three judges sentenced Weisgan to four consecutive terms of life in prison, for each person he killed, and an additional twelve years in jail. The court also ordered him to pay NIS 228,000 in damages to each of the families of the four people killed, and NIS 100,000 to another man who had been wounded. The panel ruled:

'Every one of the victims had a name and an identity... They were the immediate victims of the convicted man's actions and he must be punished for the murders of each and every one of them. It was a savage murder of innocents, who fell victim to the twisted logic of the accused.'

Weisgan has said he has no regrets about his actions because they were a 'necessary defence' of the Israeli people. He expressed the hope that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon

Ariel Sharon

Ariel Sharon is an Israeli statesman and retired general, who served as Israel’s 11th Prime Minister. He has been in a permanent vegetative state since suffering a stroke on 4 January 2006....

would be assassinated.