Israeli ballistic experts have matched the bullet that killed a Palestinian during a clash with Jewish settlers to the rifle owned by the prime suspect in the incident.
The suspect, Ze’ev Lipskind, a resident of the West Bank settlement of Beit El, was brought before the Jerusalem Magistrates Court on Wednesday, where his detention was extended by five days as police continue their investigation.
Lipskind was arrested Monday after he was identified from newspaper photographs showing him pointing his rifle directly into a group of Palestinians during Sunday’s confrontation near Beit El.
Lipskind’s lawyer, Yair Golan, told reporters that police have not proven that Lipskind actually fired the fatal bullet that killed 22-year-old Kheiri Al- Qaissi.
In any event, the lawyer added, the shooting of the Palestinian “was a clear situation of self-defense” because a crowd of Palestinians were throwing rocks at a smaller group of settlers.
The incident began when some 100 Palestinian residents of the nearby Arab village of Deir al-Kara went to the hill, where they tore down a tent erected by a group of settlers and set fire to an Israeli flag.
A short time later, a security officer from Beit El and several settlers came to the site and fired shots into the air to disperse the crowd.
The hillside encampment was set up as part of widespread settler demonstrations against any extension of Palestinian autonomy in the West Bank.
Meanwhile, demonstrators continued their hilltop protests Wednesday.
About 100 demonstrators from inside Israel remained on a West Bank hillside, setting up generators and water tanks and building structures.
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