The Krayot Magistrates Court on Sunday convicted Zvi Binstein of inciting violence after he published content on social media that encouraged violence against opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu, while he served as Prime Minister.
Binstein admitted to the acts as part of a plea deal under which the state will seek a maximum penalty of nine months of community service, along with a suspended sentence.
The indictment states that at the time the offenses were committed, there were frequent demonstrations against then-Prime Minister Netanyahu, including near his residence on Balfour Street in Jerusalem. During this time, the defendant posted content on his Twitter account calling for violence and encouraging acts of violence against the then-Prime Minister and his family.
Binstein was convicted of incitement over tweets he wrote, including: "Today the citizens of Israel are on their way to burn down the Bastille on Balfour Street, where the evil family lives" and "the accused will end up being hanged as Romanian citizens did to the corrupt leader Ceausescu."
He also wrote, "Israeli citizens are on their way to the cuckoo's nest on Balfour Street and will do to the defendant and the Balfour gang located there, what the corrupt defendant did to Yitzhak Rabin on November 5, 1995, and what Romanian citizens did, following the events of the Romanian Revolution (1989), when [the] rulers of communist Romania, Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena Ceausescu, were ousted and hanged in the city center."