Esther Horgen, 52, was beaten to death after going out on Sunday, December 20 for a jog in a forest not far from her home, located in the Tal Menashe settlement.
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Le Monde with AFP
The Israeli authorities announced Thursday, December 24 the arrest of a Palestinian and several of his alleged accomplices. They are suspected of the murder earlier this week of a Franco-Israeli near a settlement in the occupied West Bank. The body of Esther Horgen, 52, mother of six, was found on Monday, December 21, bearing beatings, in a forest near the small Israeli settlement of Tal Menashe.
Authorities Israelis have opened an investigation after reports the 50-year-old was beaten to death after going out on Sunday for a jog in a forest not far from her home.
Following an investigation by various Israeli security services, a man “suspected of being involved in the murder of Esther Horgen (…) was arrested” on Thursday , according to a statement from Shin Beth, the Israeli internal security service. He is a “Palestinian from the Jenin region” in the northern West Bank, whose interrogation by the Shin Beth was continuing.
A few hours later, the Israeli army said in a statement that “several other suspects” suspected of complicity in the murder had been arrested in the area of Jenin city for questioning. The Israeli authorities favor the nationalist track, in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, to explain the murder.
“Heinous crime”
“The army and the security forces will find all terrorists and will eradicate terrorism wherever and whenever it raises its head, “Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz wrote on Twitter on Thursday after the main suspect’s arrest. The IDF on Tuesday announced reinforcements to the West Bank amid rising tensions following the murder of Esther Horgen.
Hundreds of people attended the funeral of this Franco-Israeli, born Brigitte Attelan and who had grown up in Fontenay-aux-Roses (Hauts-de-Seine) on Tuesday before moving to Israel some 30 years ago.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised on Monday that Israel “would settle accounts” with its killer. The murder was also condemned by the French foreign ministry which denounced a “heinous crime”. “France condemns in the strongest terms the murder of a French national in the West Bank,” the ministry said earlier this week.