US-born "Jewish terrorist" nabbed after twelve years of hate crimes in Israel

[Israel Insider]

An American Jewish immigrant to Israel, apparently acting alone, allegedly carried out attacks over twelve years against people whom he hated. Ya'acov "Jack" Teitel, 37, was arrested by the Israel Police's YAMAM elite counterterror unit on October 7 as he was hanging flyers in the Jerusalem's Har Nof neighborhood which praised the attack on a Tel Aviv gay and lesbian youth club in August in which two people were killed. Teitel's spree included two Palestinian Arabs, whom he murdered, and a leftist Israeli professor, Ze'ev Sternhell, lightly wounded by a pipe bomb. It was the latter attack, carried out last year, which led to his capture.

The Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and the Israel Police also said that Teitel, a resident of Shvut Rachel in Samaria, planted a bomb at the entrance to house of a messianic missionary family in Ariel, seriously wounding their son, Ami Ortiz, then 15, who opened the explosive package disguised as a holiday gift.

Teitel, the Shin Bet stressed, was not the gunman in the Tel Aviv attack, whose perpetrator remains at large. Jerusalem Police Chief Cmdr. Aharon Franco said Teitel had confessed to, and re-enacted, many of the attacks. Police also displayed photos of a large weapons cache seized at or near the suspect's home. "He is like a serial killer. This guy was a Jewish terrorist who targeted different types of people," police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. "He was deeply involved in terrorism on all different levels."

Teitel came to Israel in 1997, he said, with the intent to avenge suicide attacks. He allegedly smuggled a handgun into Israel aboard a British Airways flight which was used to kill an east Jerusalem cab driver on June 8, 1997, and two months later a Palestinian shepherd in the South Hebron Hills.

Teitel then left Israel for Florida and returned three years later in 2000. According to the Shin Bet, he was wanted at the time by American authorities for his alleged involvement in violent criminal activity in the US. He was questioned by the Shin Bet on his return due to suspicions that he was involved in the two fatal 1997 attacks, but released for insufficient evidence. He was even licensed to carry a handgun, which he was holding, loaded, when he was arrested last month.

"He was a lone attacker," a senior Shin Bet official said. explaining why it took some 12 years since the first attack to arrest Teitel, who has a degree in business and made a living by developing web sites.

Teitel, officials said, was a self-taught expert in weapons smuggling and bombmaking, importing into Israel another nine automatic machine guns and handguns hidden in a shipping container. He never served in the IDF or the US military, officials said. His father served for many years as a dentist in the US Marines and officials suggested that Teitel may have learned about weapons and explosives on American military bases.

Officials said that Teitel was extremely cautious and did not discuss his attacks with anyone, not even his wife. Police said that when he was arrested hanging flyers, he was wearing thick gloves so as not to leave fingerprints.

Teitel's crimes all appear motivated by hatred. He even allegedly attempted to bomb Israeli police stations and patrols because they provided security for gay pride parades.

In April 2007, Teitel allegedly planted a bomb next to the Beit Jamal Monastery near Beit Shemesh, injuring a Palestinian tractor driver. Teitel told interrogators that he planted the device because he heard that the monastery was seducing Jewish children with candy.

He confessed to planting a bomb in Ariel on March 20, 2008, at the entrance to the home of the Ortiz family, part of a "messianic" group involved in trying to convert Jews to Christianity.

On September 25, 2008, Teitel reportedly planted a bomb at the entrance to the home of Sternhell in Jerusalem, which lightly wounded the well-known academic and Peace Now activist. Teitel said he decided to target Sternhell after the professor, a winner of the Israel Prize, had issued statements that Teitel interprets as calls to kill Jewish settlers.

Teitel also confessed to stabbing an Arab youth in 1997 in the capital's Independence Park, believing the boy was making sexual advances at him.

Officials said that Teitel has been planning additional attacks when he was arrested, but would not specify against whom.

In the arms cache found near his house, police discovered a sophisticated sniper rifle, an M15 machine gun, an M16 shortened automatic rifle, a Glock handgun and a Browning 9mm handgun.

The gun that he said he smuggled into Israel aboard a British Airways flight and was used in the 1997 murders was not discovered by police. He said he hid it next to the Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem. Despite extensive searches, it has not been found.

While police do not have the murder weapon, they said that Teitel confessed to those shootings, reenacted them and knew details that only the murderer could have known.

Teitel created names for himself in flyers and other documents. In one he called himself the "Red Hand for Redemption" and called the perpetrator of the August attack on the Tel Aviv gay and lesbian youth club the "Black Bear."
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu congratulated security officials for their actions against those who violently take the law into their own hands.

Security officials briefed Netanyahu about the case a few weeks ago, and he had Teitel in mind when he prepared some remarks to the Knesset last Thursday on the 14th anniversary of prime minister Yitzhak Rabin's assassination. "There still exists among us a minority that is not willing to accept democratic decisions or the supremacy of law... They constitute a small marginal minority. We have already seen the power and the harm caused by one murderer. We must denounce the use of violence and use the full weight of law enforcement to prevent the use of such violence," Netanyahu said.

Teitel has lived in Shvut Rachel for six years, his brother-in-law Moshe Avitan said. The alleged terrorist was described as a loner who spoke no Hebrew and rarely expressed political opinions. He worked from home, and he his wife, Rivka, were characterized as a quiet couple who kept mostly to themselves. They have children aged four months, and two, three and five years.

In a statement to the media, the Shvut Rachel settlement, which numbers about 120 families, said it stood behind Teitel and while denouncing the kind of violent attacks with which he had been charged. "Until he has been proven guilty we believe in his innocence," the community said. It added that it was upset by the way the Left was exploiting the incident and using it to incite people against all settlers.