A man was sentenced Wednesday to 21 years in prison for the brutal rape of a woman in her home in Gedera in 2023, in a case that charged Jewish-Arab tensions despite no evidence of nationalist motivations.

Barakat Abu Asa, from the Bedouin town of Tel Sheva, was found guilty in April of aggravated rape and abusing his victim’s two-year-old son, who was present in the house at the time of the assault.

According to the indictment, Abu Asa had been working at a construction site across from the victim’s home in the central town.

On the night of February 2, 2023, he broke into her home by way of the building’s balcony, equipped with rolls of thick tape, which he used to tie her wrists and ankles and cover her mouth and her eyes.

When the woman began screaming for help, he said: “Shut up or I’ll kill you,” while her two-year-old son stood by and cried. Abu Asa then dragged her to the house’s safe room and raped her.

Within the hour, Abu Asa went to the kitchen, took a bottle of beer and drank it before the victim’s other son woke up and helped free his mother with a knife, according to the Ynet news site. The offender then fled the scene.

The victim, a woman in her 30s, had posted a message in her neighborhood’s WhatsApp group the........

© The Times of Israel