Ami POPPER
Classification: Mass murderer
Characteristics: Revenge
Number of victims: 7
Date of murders: May 20, 1990
Date of arrest: Same day
Date of birth: 1969
Victims profile: Male palestinians
Method of murder: Shooting
Location: Rishon Lezion, Israel
Status: Sentence to seven life terms 1991. Commuted to 40 years 1999
Put on his army uniform and asked men waiting at a bus stop in a southern Israeli town for their identity cards. After confirming they were Arabs he lined them up and opened fire, killing seven.
He left the scene in a car belonging to one of the Palestinians, but was taken into custody after contacting police.
Ami Popper (Hebrew: עמי פופר; born 1969) is an Israeli convicted of murder.
Popper, a former dishonorably-discharged soldier, put on his army uniform on 20 May 1990 and asked men waiting at a bus stop in the Israeli town of Rishon Lezion for their identity cards. After confirming they were Arabs he lined them up and opened fire, killing seven. Within an hour, he was arrested by Israeli police.
After his act, Arab riots led to the deaths of seven more Palestinians, and 700 injured.
Israel Radio reported that Popper claimed to have been distraught because his girlfriend had decided to leave him. Later he told police that he had been raped by an Arab when he was 13 and had commited these killings out of shame and a desire for revenge.
Popper was charged and convicted of seven acts of murder in March 1991. In prison he became religious and in June 1993 he married a Canadian woman from a family of Kach activists. They had three children.
In February, 1999 Popper's sentence was commuted from seven life terms to 40 years. Currently he is expected be released on parole in 2023, after 33 years in prison.
On January 17, 2007, while on a 48-hour furlough, Popper was involved in a car accident caused by him crossing a solid line. His wife and one of his sons were killed in the accident. Popper himself was moderately injured. Israeli police reported that Popper's license had expired in 1999.
Israeli kills 7 Arabs, wounds 10
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
May 20, 1990
A 20-year-old Israeli armed with a U.S.-made M-16 assault rifle opened fire on a group of Palestinians waiting to go to work in a town south of Tel Aviv, killing seven and wounding 10, Israel radio said.
The radio report said the gunman apparently was a civilian. He left the scene in a car belonging to one of the Palestinians, but was taken into custody after contacting police, the radio said.
Shooting spree
San Jose Mercury News
May 20, 1990
An Israeli armed with a U.S.-made M-16 assault rifle opened fire today on a group of Palestinians waiting to go to work in a town south of Tel Aviv, killing seven and wounding 10, Israel radio said. It was the bloodiest attack by an Israeli against Arabs since the start of the 29-month-old Palestinian uprising. The radio said the gunman was a 20-year-old civilian. He escaped in a car belonging to one of the Palestinians, but was taken into custody after contacting police, the radio said.
Israeli kills 7 Arabs, hurts 11
The Miami Herald
May 21, 1990
RISHON LEZION, Israel -- An Israeli wearing a military uniform and armed with an automatic assault rifle opened fire Sunday on Palestinian workers, killing seven and wounding 11.
Within an hour of the killings, the suspected assailant -- a 21-year-old man -- was arrested. He was described in an Israel Radio report as distraught because his girlfriend had decided to leave him.
Israeli killers' sentences reduced
BBC News
Thursday, February 4, 1999
The Israeli Government has cut the prison sentences of four Israelis jailed for murdering Palestinians and one convicted murderer is to be released.
One of the prisioners, Ami Popper, killed seven Palestinians in an shooting spree in 1990. His sentence has been reduced from seven life sentences to 40 years in prison.
Another prisoner, Nehemiah Mishbaum, who threw a grenade into an Arab butchers' market, killing one, will now walk free after 11 years.
Israel's justice minister told Israeli radio that the review of their sentences was justified because the government had released a number of Palestinian prisoners over recent years as a result of the peace process.
'Double standards'
Palestinian human rights activists have voiced their opposition to the policy saying Israel's position is that it will not release any Palestinian prisoners who "have Jewish blood on their hands".
The human rights activists say Palestinians who murder Israelis are charged in military courts and handed down severe sentences.
By contrast, they say, Israelis guilty of murdering Palestinians often claim self-defence and when they are charged, usually sit before regular courts which deal out lighter sentences.
The issue of prisoners was central to the recent stalling of the Wye peace accord. The Israelis had agreed to release 750 Palestinian prisoners, but the Palestinians complained that many of those who were actually released were common criminals.
Wife, son of Ami Popper die in collision
Israel.Jpost.com
Jan 18, 2007
The wife and six-year-old son of convicted Jewish terrorist Ami Popper were killed Wednesday night when the car he was driving collided head-on with one full of tourists on the Arava Highway, 50 km. north of Eilat, police said.
Five others were injured - two seriously - including Popper's two other children. The identities of those in the second vehicle were not released to the press.
Popper, who was on a 48-hour furlough from prison, was moderately injured, while his son was pronounced dead at the scene. His wife, Sarah, 42, an American-born social worker affiliated with the Kahane Chai movement, was killed instantly.
Popper is serving 40 years at Ma'asiyahu Prison near Ramle. He was originally given seven life sentences - one for each of the seven Palestinian laborers he gunned down near Rishon Lezion on May 20, 1990.
The initial investigation suggests the three Popper children were sitting in the backseat without seat belts. Police said they believed that Ami Popper had been distracted by his children, causing him to veer into oncoming traffic.
Popper's driving license expired in 1999, police said.
According to traffic authorities, one of the vehicles, most likely Popper's, made a sudden move into oncoming traffic just before 9:30 p.m., causing "one of the more horrific accidents we have seen... completely unnecessary." Magen David Adom medics treated casualties as firefighters extracted others from the wreckage. Two helicopters evacuated the most seriously injured to Soroka Hospital in Beersheba.
After completing the first 10 years of his sentence, Popper was allowed furloughs. He reportedly left the prison grounds more than 120 times since 2000.
A police representative said that the Shin Bet (Israel Security Services), and not the Israel Prisons Service, was responsible for approving the frequency and durations of Popper's furloughs.
The Shin Bet referred questions about the accident to the Prime Minister's Office.
Ami Popper's shooting rampage rocked the nation and still resonates 16 years later. Popper, 21 at the time, arrived at the Rose Garden Junction between Rishon Lezion and Ness Ziona with an IDF-issued rifle that he had stolen from his younger brother. He lined up Arab workers at the junction, and even stopped a car with West Bank plates, making the passengers join the lineup that he then raked with gunfire, stopping several times to reload.
Seven people were killed and 10 were wounded in the attack, and riots broke out across the territories, leading to additional Palestinian deaths from IDF fire.
Following his arrest, Popper told police he shot the men after his girlfriend left him, only to say later that he was raped by an Arab during his childhood and had acted out of shame and a desire for revenge.
