Israeli President Pardons Soldier Convicted of Killing Wounded Palestinian in Hebron

Israeli President Isaac Herzog has pardoned Elor Azaria, the former army medic convicted of manslaughter for shooting a wounded Palestinian man in the head in Hebron in 2016, wiping the conviction from his record, Haaretz reported Saturday.

Azaria shot 21-year-old Abdel Fattah al-Sharif as he lay on the ground, already wounded by Israeli gunfire. A Palestinian photographer working for the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem captured the killing on camera. The footage triggered outrage in Israel and the occupied territories; the Palestinian foreign ministry called it an "extrajudicial execution," and the Israeli military itself said Azaria had violated the army's ethics code.

A military court convicted Azaria of manslaughter in 2017 and sentenced him to 18 months in prison. Then-army chief Gadi Eisenkot reduced the term to 14 months. Azaria was released in May 2018 after serving nine.

Herzog's office said in a statement that Azaria had "borne the consequences of his actions" and expressed remorse, and that the pardon was granted in the spirit of Yom Kippur, "out of a belief in the importance of repair, reconciliation, and the ability to move forward."

According to Haaretz, Herzog acted against the recommendation of current army chief Eyal Zamir, who wrote to the president opposing the pardon on the grounds that Azaria had shown no public remorse.

Defence Minister Israel Katz, who submitted the pardon request, called it "a correct, humane, and fitting decision" and said it tells Israeli soldiers "we do not abandon soldiers and do not leave them behind." Azaria thanked Herzog, Katz and "God" on Channel 14 News, calling it "a blessed week," and told Katz by phone that "it is important that no fighter goes through what I went through."

Not everyone agreed. Moshe Yaalon, the defence minister who resigned three months after the 2016 shooting citing distrust of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's handling of the case, called the pardon "a disgrace" on X.

Yaalon said Azaria "did not claim he shot the terrorist because he felt his life was in danger, but rather 'because he deserved to die.'"

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who protested for Azaria's release a decade ago, said the pardon "moves and delights me very much," and argued that under the current government's revised rules of engagement, Azaria would never have been convicted at all.

The pardon lands as former army chief Eisenkot, who oversaw Azaria's original sentence, leads opinion polls ahead of Israel's October elections. Yaalon accused Herzog of joining Netanyahu's broader campaign against Eisenkot.

The Israeli military's account holds that al-Sharif had carried out a stabbing attack in Hebron's Tal Rumeida neighborhood before he was shot, a claim disputed by Palestinian accounts and human rights groups at the time. B'Tselem has separately documented 1,087 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank and East Jerusalem between October 2023 and June 2026, including 242 children.