JERUSALEM (JTA) — Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called the killing of five members of a West Bank Jewish family "despicable, inhuman and immoral."
"A human being is not capable of something like that," Abbas said in Arabic during an interview Monday morning on Israel Radio. His words were translated into Hebrew by the interviewer.
"Had we had advance information, we would have prevented this," Abbas said of the March 11 attack that left five members of the Fogel family of Itamar dead, including a 3-month-old baby.
Abbas also said that the Palestinian Authority would work to find the killer or killers responsible, and that he has agreed to a request by Israel to launch a joint investigation.
Abbas, who called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday to offer his condolences — Netanyahu called them "weak and mumbled statements" — took issue during the interview with Netanyahu’s accusation that the Palestinian Authority incites against Israel in its mosques and schools. The PA leader offered to set up an Israeli-Palestinian-American committee to look into the allegations.
