16-year-old Pride stabbing victim dies of her wounds

Shira Banki [Facebook photo]

 A 16-year-old girl who was stabbed at the Jerusalem Gay Pride parade has died.

Shira Banki, a high school student from Jerusalem, died Sunday afternoon at Hadassah Medical Centre in Ein Kerem, where she had been fighting for her life after being stabbed in the chest and stomach. Her family agreed to donate her organs, Hadassah announced.

Banki was marching to support her gay friends, her family said in a statement.

“Our magical Shira was murdered because she was a happy 16-year-old – full of life and love – who came to express her support for her friends’ rights to live as they choose. For no good reason and because of evil, stupidity and negligence, the life of our beautiful flower was cut short. Bad things happen to good people, and a very bad thing happened to our amazing girl,” the family said in a statement, which also expressed “hope for less hatred and more tolerance.”

Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said in a statement: “The murder at the Pride parade in the streets of Jerusalem is a criminal act, and we won’t let it achieve its objective. We’ll continue to allow complete free expression in the city for everyone, continue to support all the groups and communities in the city and Open House. We’ll continue the education to accept the other and tolerance in the education system and won’t be deterred by those who try to prevent this by foul methods.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered condolences to the Banki family in a statement.

“Shira was murdered because she courageously supported the principle according to which everyone is entitled to live their lives in dignity and safety,” Netanyahu said Sunday. “We will not allow the abhorrent murderer to undermine the fundamental values upon which Israeli society is based. We strongly condemn the attempt to instill hatred and violence in our midst and we will deal with the murderer to the fullest extent of the law.”

Yishai Schlissel, a haredi Orthodox man from Modiin Ilit in the West Bank, remains in police custody after being deemed psychologically fit to stand trial on Friday, a day after he allegedly stabbed six marchers. Schlissel had been released from prison three weeks earlier after serving 10 years for a similar attack at Jerusalem’s 2005 Gay Pride parade.

The Jerusalem Open House for Pride and Tolerance, a community centre in Jerusalem that provides services to LGBTQ individuals, said it and the LGBTQ community in Jerusalem mourned Banki’s death “at the hands of a fanatic, consumed with hatred and fear.”

“The knife that fatally injured Shira was sharpened by years of incitement,” the centre said in a statement. “That knife targeted all those who believe in a just society, where every woman and man can live freely, without fear of violence and persecution. That knife has wounded all those who believe in life and in God’s creation.”

The Jerusalem Open House vowed to continue the Pride march in Jerusalem.

On Saturday night, police for the second time detained the wife of an unnamed rabbi who has been vocal in his opposition to the Pride parade on suspicion that the couple was aware of Schlissel’s plans to attack marchers at Thursday’s parade, the Times of Israel reported, citing Hebrew news reports.

In the wake of the stabbing attack, an Israeli lawmaker announced that he is gay.

Itzik Shmuli of the Zionist Union on Friday went public with his sexual orientation in a column in the Israeli Hebrew-language daily Yediot Acharonot, saying that “it is no longer possible to remain silent.”

“We can no longer remain silent because the knife is raised against the neck of the entire LGBT community, my community,” Shmuli wrote Friday. “It will not stop there. This is the time to fight the great darkness.”

Meanwhile, one day after calling the Jerusalem gay pride parade an “abomination march,” another Israeli Knesset member was standing by his remarks.

“So here I say it again fearlessly: I object vehemently to violence, and promise to object no less vehemently to the recognition of same-sex couples in the Jewish State,” Betzalel Smotrich of the pro-settlement Jewish Home party wrote Sunday in a Facebook post. “I promise to fight violence, and no less than that, I will fight any attempt to besmirch traditional Jewish family values.”

Smotrich had made the remarks about the “abomination march” on Twitter the previous evening.

In response, LGBT activists flooded the lawmaker’s Facebook page over the weekend with photos of gay couples and memes mocking Smotrich, the Times of Israel reported.

On Facebook, Smotrich said the organizers of Saturday night anti-violence protests in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, following the stabbing of six at the gay pride march in Jerusalem on Thursday, were about incitement and silencing anyone who opposes their views. The protests were also in response to an arson attack on a Palestinian West Bank village early Friday that killed an 18-month-old boy.

Smotrich said that the demonstrations’ organizers “saved [Jewish Home chairman Naftali] Bennett from himself,” by withdrawing an invitation for him to speak at the Tel Aviv rally. Bennett’s invitation was rescinded after a hostile reaction from participants to his participation and after he refused to sign a pledge committing to advancing homosexual-themed legislation.

Bennett, who said he was on his way to the rally when organizers called and told not to show up, tried to repair the damage done by Smotrich, but said he would not support recognition of same-sex marriage.

“I am in favor of full rights for the gay community,” Bennett told Army Radio on Sunday. “In terms of formal recognition by the State of Israel for marriage , I am not.”

In a Facebook post on Sunday, Bennett said: “Whoever wants to find me fighting against violence, I am next to him with all my strength. Whoever wants me to remain silent, I will stand up to him with all my heart.”