As recently as last month, Israel’s foreign ministry last month criticized foreign reporters for their supposed blindness to the plight of gay Palestinians in Gaza, in an animated video mocking international coverage of the conflict.

Attempts by Israelis to use support for gay rights as a cudgel against Palestinian groups have misfired at times. In 2011, a gay Israeli man who claimed to have been discriminated against by pro-Palestinian activists was exposed as an actor after his false testimony had been shared online by government officials.

After Thursday’s attack, whose suspect is a religious fundamentalist from a Jewish-only settlement built on West Bank land Israel has occupied since 1967, Mr. Abunimah seconded the observation of a Canadian activist who speculated that Israel’s military would have destroyed Mr. Schlissel’s home had he been a Palestinian.