Israeli soldier convicted over wounded man

An Israeli soldier was convicted of manslaughter on Wednesday in the deadly shooting of an incapacitated Palestinian attacker, capping a nine-month saga that has deeply divided the country.

The verdict, which marks an extremely rare case of an Israeli military court siding against a soldier over lethal action taken in the field, threatened to deepen the rift.

Military commanders have condemned the soldier's conduct while much of the public, along with leading members of the nationalist ruling coalition, have rallied behind him.

With Sgt. Elor Azaria's sentencing believed to be weeks away, the country now faces a heated debate over whether he deserves clemency.

Within minutes of the verdict, leading politicians were already calling for him to be pardoned.

Azaria, an army medic, was caught on a cellphone video in March fatally shooting a wounded Palestinian attacker who had stabbed a soldier in the West Bank city of Hebron.

The Palestinian, Abdel Fattah al-Sharif, was lying on the ground and already unarmed when Azaria shot him in the head.

"We found there was no room to accept his arguments," Colonel Maya Heller, head of the three judge panel said.

"His motive for shooting was that he felt the terrorist deserved to die."

The defence team said it would appeal.

After the judges walked out, Azaria's mother, Oshra, screamed, "You should be ashamed of yourselves."

Hundreds of the soldier's supporters, many of them young religious men wearing skullcaps, gathered outside the military court in Tel Aviv ahead of the verdict. The crowd, holding large Israeli flags and banners that said "the nation neglected a soldier on the battlefield" periodically scuffled with police.

While the verdict was being read, some demonstrators chanted a death threat against the Israeli army's chief, Lieutenant Gadi Eizenkot, insinuating he would face the same fate of slain Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, assassinated 20 years ago by an ultranationalist Israeli.

The crowd was quickly dispersed without any further violence.