JERUSALEM (AFP) — Israeli authorities on Thursday were considering demolishing the home of a Palestinian man who went on a bulldozer rampage in Jerusalem and killed three people before he was shot dead.
A previous military inquiry ruled the practice ineffectual, but much of the political establishment now favours destroying the house of any Jerusalem Palestinian who conducts attacks in Israel.
"Following a request by the government, Attorney General Menahem Mazuz will look today into the legal problems that might be involved in demolishing the houses in east Jerusalem," justice spokesman Moshe Cohen told AFP.
Israeli law distinguishes between Arab east Jerusalem, which Israel annexed after the 1967 Middle East war, and the rest of the occupied West Bank, which remains under military rule.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert raised the issue after the Palestinian from east Jerusalem ploughed a bulldozer into several vehicles on a deadly rampage on Wednesday that also wounded another 45 people.
"The prime minister held consultations last night with the relevant government bodies and the military in the wake of the attack ," Olmert spokesman Mark Regev told AFP.
"They discussed different means of action" including revoking residency permits, scrapping welfare benefits and house demolitions.
In remarks at an economic conference on Thursday, Olmert said: "If we need to destroy houses, we will destroy houses; if we need to stop social welfare we will stop social welfare."
A senior official in the welfare ministry confirmed to AFP that the government would cut off all benefits to the attacker's family.
President Shimon Peres told public radio that "Wednesday's terrorist may have chosen not to carry out his attack if he had known his family could be punished for the act."
Deputy Prime Minister Haim Ramon also said he considered it "just that the house of the bulldozer terrorist should be destroyed," but acknowledged that "it would not prevent the next attack."
During the Palestinian uprising of the early 2000s Israel systematically destroyed the homes of Palestinians involved in deadly attacks. The practice stopped in 2005 after then military chief of staff Lieutenant General Moshe Yaalon said it was not a deterrent.
Security forces on Thursday detained an uncle of the bullodozer driver in the east Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sur Baher, where the attacker, identified as Hossam Dwayyat, 30, lived, according to an AFP photographer.
They also ordered relatives to take down a mourning tent set up outside the uncle's house.
Authorities called the attack "an act of terrorism" but Police Commissioner Dudi Cohen said it appeared to be a "spontaneous incident" carried out by a father of two with a criminal past but no known links to armed groups.
Dwayyat's brother Issam told Israel's Ynet news service that the family refused to believe their son carried out a terror attack.
"My brother did not belong to any organisation. He wasn't even a religious person. After terror attacks he always used to say, 'What is this nonsense? Why do we need this?'" Issam said.
"Any person responsible for a road accident is alarmed and afraid. This can happen to anyone, and this could have been a road accident. It's possible that my brother was scared when people started chasing him and shooting," he said.
However, Issam did not rule out that his brother might have lost control and gone on a rampage under the influence of drugs. "It was easy to irritate him. He had a criminal record for violent offences and he was punished for this."
Dwayyat's Jewish former partner told the private Channel 10 television that she had lived with him for more than five years in the family home at Sur Baher and ruled out a political motive.
"Maybe it was a temporary act of madness, or maybe he had problems at home," said the woman who was shown but whose name was not given.
She said Dwayyat had served a year in jail for hitting her and that he had threatened to kill her in the past.
"We loved each other but he became very violent when he was jealous," she added.
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