Israeli who stabbed a Jew he mistook for an Arab charged with attempted murder

THE TIMES OF ISRAEL

A 33-year-old Israeli man was charged with attempted murder on Sunday for stabbing a Jewish man in a parking lot three weeks ago after mistaking him for an Arab.

Shlomo Pinto, a resident of Kiryat Ata, attacked supermarket worker Uri Razkan on October 13 in an Ikea parking lot in the Haifa suburb.

He was indicted on two counts of attempted murder and possession of a knife.

According to Army Radio, Pinto on October 13 approached an Arab man and asked him if he was Arab. The Arab man was reportedly frightened by the question, and said he was not.

Minutes later, the attacker identified another passerby, concluded he was Arab from his appearance, and proceeded to stab him in his upper torso.

The victim, it turned out, was an Israeli Jew.

“I heard a shout, ‘You deserve it, you deserve it, Arab bastards!’ When I turn around I see a Haredi man. I shouted to him, ‘I’m a Jew,’ but he tried to continue. I just ran away; otherwise I would have been killed,” Razkan told Army Radio of the attack.

Pinto was subdued by passersby and Razkan was hospitalized with light to moderate injuries.

The attack came amid a spate of Palestinian stabbing attacks against Israelis in Jerusalem and elsewhere that raised tensions and fears across the country and in the West Bank.

Last week, police said Pinto confessed to the attempted hate crime