![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/615633.jpeg\"\/)
President Isaac Herzog. (credit: HAIM ZACH\/GPO)<\/p>\nDefense Minister Israel Katz submitted a presidential pardon request on behalf of Elor Azaria on Tuesday, 10 years after the infamous Hebron shooting that cast a spotlight on the IDF\u2019s code of ethics and exposed deep divisions in Israeli society.<\/p>\n
Azaria was convicted on January 4, 2017, of manslaughter for shooting an incapacitated Palestinian man, Abdel Fattah al-Sharif, one year prior, on March 24, 2016. Al-Sharif and another Palestinian had carried out a stabbing attack against an IDF soldier and were shot by troops, leaving al-Sharif wounded on the ground before Azaria shot him in the head.<\/p>\n
Katz\u2019s letter, submitted to President Isaac Herzog, is a formal recommendation. The request itself comes from Azaria, and is specifically to expunge his criminal record; he has been out of prison since 2018.<\/p>\n
In 2017, he was charged with manslaughter and conduct unbecoming, and was sentenced to 18 months in prison. However, his sentence was commuted in September 2017 to 14 months by then-IDF chief of staff and current primary opposition candidate, Gadi Eisenkot.<\/p>\n
Then-defense minister and current Yisrael Beytenu head Avigdor Liberman then submitted a pardon recommendation. Then-president Reuven Rivlin declined it in November of 2017, explaining that such a move would harm the resilience of both the IDF and the State of Israel as a whole.<\/p>\n
President Isaac Herzog. (credit: HAIM ZACH\/GPO)<\/p>\n
Rivlin said at the time that he thought \u201can additional lightening of your sentence would harm the resilience of the IDF and the State of Israel. The IDF\u2019s values\u2026 are the core foundation of the strength of the IDF,\u201d and have helped Israel \u201cin the just struggle for our right to a safe, national home, and in building a robust society.\u201d<\/p>\n
Katz wrote on Tuesday that the resilience claim \u201cceased to be relevant with the passage of time,\u201d especially given the fact that Azaria already served his sentence, and the request now is only to shorten the time in which his criminal record was to be erased.<\/p>\n
A military parole board later trimmed his sentence by a third, and he was officially released on May 10, 2018, after serving nine of the 14-month sentence.<\/p>\n
Another request was submitted in 2022 but was never fully actualized. Now, four years later, comes the third pardon request by Azaria.<\/p>\n
Katz noted that in his letter, Azaria highlighted the passage of time and requested that his criminal record on the issue be wiped because it is making it difficult for him to integrate smoothly into society and into the workforce.<\/p>\n
The IDF’s position, Katz wrote, is contrary to his, and is that Azaria’s request should not be honored.<\/p>\n
The defense minister made several arguments as to why the request should be accepted.<\/p>\n
He explained that the killing happened over a decade ago, Azaria already served his time, and that what is being requested here is quite simple: To shorten the time period until the criminal record is clean.<\/p>\n
He also spoke to Azaria’s character, writing that he was an outstanding soldier and that he had no criminal record prior to this incident. He noted as well what he described as the complex conditions of the incident itself, where the slain terrorist stabbed and injured two of Azaria’s friends.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe incident took place when Azaria was a young soldier in highly intense and stressful conditions, in a complex security situation,\u201d wrote Katz.<\/p>\n
In fact, when the original military court had sentenced him back in 2017, it said that his clean prior record and the stress of the operational situation had indeed led to a lighter sentence.<\/p>\n
The Defense Minister added in his letter that the media exposure that followed for Azaria and his family \u201cdemanded from them a very high price,\u201d like psychological and emotional issues.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis face and the minute details of the incident have become something that is widely known in the public,\u201d Katz wrote, adding that unlike \u201cmany\u201d other instances, \u201cwhere a person could serve their time and return to their anonymity and build their life back,\u201d Azaria cannot do that.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is unreasonable that, a decade later, [Azaria] continues to pay too heavy of a price… one that is preventing him from working and earning a living in a respectable way,\u201d Katz wrote.<\/p>\n
Herzog has stated that he would need to wait to receive additional recommendations before proceeding with the request.<\/p>\n
“After receiving all opinions, the President will weigh the request responsibly and with due seriousness,” the president stated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Defense Minister Israel Katz submitted a presidential pardon request on behalf of Elor Azaria on Tuesday, 10 years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":540615,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[65413,42,2894,2723,43,98,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-540614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-criminality","tag-headlines","tag-isaac-herzog","tag-israel-katz","tag-news","tag-terrorism","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=540614"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/540614\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/540615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=540614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=540614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=540614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}