Palestinian-American died of heart attack after Israeli detention, autopsy finds
A Palestinian autopsy found that Omar Abdalmajeed As'ad died from a “stress-induced sudden cardiac arrest due to external violence.”
An elderly Palestinian-American man who died after being detained in an Israeli raid on the outskirts of Ramallah this month suffered from a stress-induced cardiac arrest likely caused by being bound and gagged by soldiers, according to the findings of a Palestinian autopsy.
Omar Abdalmajeed As'ad, 78, was found dead on Jan. 12 by residents of Jiljilya, a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. A plastic zip tie remained on his wrist. A local official told Reuters that “Israeli soldiers stopped his car, bound him [and] blindfolded him,” and led him to a construction site.
A nearby physician, Islam Abu Zaher, told The Washington Post that As’ad’s face was blue by the time he reached him minutes after the soldiers left the scene. He added that As’ad was likely without oxygen for 15-20 minutes.
