IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Benny Gantz meets with two surviving children of the Fogel family earlier this year. (Photo credit: Israel Defense Forces.)

JERUSALEM, Israel — Amjad Awad, 19, became the second Palestinian man convicted of the murder of the Fogel family on Monday, Nov. 28. His cousin Hakim Awad was convicted for the same crime earlier in the year and is serving five consecutive life sentences.
In March of 2010, the two men entered a home in the West Bank village of Itamar. They murdered Ehud and Ruth Fogel and three of their children: Yoav, 11, Elad, 4, and 3-month-old Hadas. Hakim held down the children as Amjad stabbed them to death.
Three Fogel children —Tamar, 12, Roi, 6, and Yishai, 2 — escaped and survived. Amjad confessed to the murders last month.
As the military court prepared to hand down its sentence, a poll of Israelis showed that 70 percent want the killer executed. Israeli courts, including military ones, can impose the death penalty by law but never do. —JointMedia News Service