Teenager run over and killed in TA

Court extends remand of suspect • Driver suspected of being under the influence

Thirteen-year-old Eilon Shalev Amsalem was killed late Friday night and another youth injured when a car ran them over while they were standing on the sidewalk at the corner of Ibn Gvirol and Shai Agnon in Tel Aviv.

Police arrested the driver, Eliyahu Bar-Zakkai, a 23-year-old resident of Jerusalem, who is suspected of having driven under the influence of alcohol.

The Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court released him to house arrest on Sunday and extended his remand until July 31.

“When we got there, we saw the car’s shattered windshield and the front of the car damaged by the pavement, said Magen David Adom paramedics Aharon Fisher and Shalom Klein.

“A few meters away, a 13-year-old boy lay unconscious on the road. During an initial inspection, we conducted a search of the scene and a large distance away we located another casualty without a pulse, who was not breathing and who was suffering from severe multiple-organ damage,” said the paramedics.

“We immediately began treating him and he was evacuated by ambulance to the [Ichilov] hospital,” they said.

“The injured person who lay on the road was also taken to hospital a few minutes later, where he is in moderate condition and suffers from injuries to his upper body.”

Bar-Zakkai’s lawyer, Eilon Oron, said his client lost control of his vehicle because a ruptured water pipe had flooded the road.

Oron denied allegations that Bar-Zakkai was intoxicated, saying that he could not have prevented the accident.

Oron also disputed reports that his client refused to take a breathalyzer test, saying that he agreed to take the test but couldn’t breathe properly because of his agitated state following the accident.

Traffic accidents have claimed 170 lives so far in 2018, compared to 229 in the same period last year.

Fifty-one of the fatalities were pedestrians, according to the National Road Safety Authority.