FLASHBACK: How The Post reported the murder and dragging in Gaza. (
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The Palestinian man whose body was dragged behind motorcycles after Hamas thugs executed him as a spy has been identified — and his family insists he wasn’t a spy at all.
Ribhi Badawi, a father of five, “was a proud Palestinian,’’ his widow, Kholoud, told The Daily Mail.
“He loved his country with a rare passion — and he was more opposed to Israeli occupation than Hamas is.”
Masked men pulled Badawi, 37, and five other suspected informers for Israel from a van that had stopped in a busy Gaza City neighborhood last week and ordered them to lie face-down on the street.
The victims were shot one by one, witnesses said, and, after a street mob had kicked and spit on the bodies, Badawi’s body was tied to a motorcycle with a cable and dragged through the street.
Photos and video of the savage display drew condemnation from around the globe.
Badawi was a member of the hard-line Islamist group Jaljalat, the British paper reported.
He was arrested in 2009 on terrorism charges and tortured until he confessed to being a traitor.
“His enemies used the war as an excuse to kill him,” his widow told the newspaper.
Hamas officials declined to comment on the family’s claims but repeated that the killings were “unlawful.’’
In other developments:
* A new Israeli air shield passed its first field test last week, officials said yesterday.
David’s Sling, as the system is called, is effective against rockets more powerful than those stopped by Iron Dome, which had a 90 percent success rate and intercepted 421 of the rockets fired from Gaza over the eight-day conflict, which has ended, at least for now, with a cease- fire.
Israel, worried about deteriorating security on its borders with Gaza, Lebanon and Syria, rushed David’s Sling through development.
* In a move that could spark new tension in the region, the body of the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat — who died eight years ago — will be exhumed tomorrow in an investigation into whether he was murdered.
A Palestinian leader said there is “evidence which suggests Arafat was assassinated by Israelis.”
Israel denies any involvement.