An Israeli court this week sentenced a 64-year-old former educator to 24 months in prison for helping her daughter stab a woman in Jaffa. The assault followed an earlier physical confrontation between the victim and the daughter near a Tel Aviv-Yafo grocery store, and the pair later waited outside the victim’s home with kitchen knives.
According to the indictment and verdict, the mother and daughter decided to attack the woman after that clash, took two large kitchen knives, drove to her house and waited there for about 15 minutes. A text message sent beforehand said, “I’m going there, I’m going, I’m bringing knives with me, I’m going to butcher her.” When the victim returned home, the two got out of the car and ran toward her. One shouted, “You whore, today we are killing you. You will not live.”
The victim tried to stop the attack and pleaded, “Please stop, my son, let me take him and then do whatever you want,” but was stabbed multiple times before the attackers fled. She suffered wounds to her neck, back, shoulders and other areas, was taken to Ichilov Hospital, underwent two operations and received three units of blood. A victim impact report said she now has a 60 percent disability rating from the National Insurance Institute, has been diagnosed with post-trauma, uses medical cannabis and psychiatric medication, has nerve damage in her hand, and can no longer work in her former professions. Her son, who witnessed the attack, also suffers post-traumatic symptoms.
Prosecutors said the crime was carefully planned and asked for 8 to 12 years in prison. The defense argued the defendant had no criminal record, had suffered domestic violence, and saw her daughter return home humiliated after the dispute, calling it a one-off episode. In her final statement, the defendant said she was sorry and asked forgiveness from the victim, her children and society, saying she had spent decades in education and had always chosen nonviolence. Judge Melamed rejected the claim of a spontaneous outburst, wrote that the outcome was “almost accidental” rather than inevitable, and also ordered 35,000 shekels in compensation and a 1,000-shekel fine.
